30.01.05
css design
i'm a big fan of css. an avid latex user, i strongly support the separation of content from design. i personally don't really have the design know-how to make something really pretty, css or not, but even for me it makes life so much easier. it's the classic 'a little more effort in the beginning, a lot less work in the end' phenomenon. or, as someone once said: 'writing bad code takes just as long'.
the css zen garden has a nice demonstration of how versatile your design can be with the same content.
click on the links to the right to switch the css page rendering the same html, and then - please - stop using <font> and <center> tags forever.
flesh, tips-n-tricks, nostalgia, israel
the pita pocket
a friend asked me how to bake pita bread. i searched for a recipe, and found one that was pretty good. yesterday i baked some pitas, and everyone i talked to about it asked me the same question: how do you get the pocket in?
my intuition was that it has to do with the fact that you bake it very quickly in very high heat, which causes the crust to form immediately, and then when the center bloats it stretches, but doesn't rip the crust.
strangely enough, an israeli q&a site has just been asked to solve the same mystery. thanks to yoad for linking me up.
the link is in hebrew but you should at least go in there to see what real pita bread looks like. nothing like the stuff you buy in the stores here.
as for the solution to the problem, here's a rough translation of the central points (the author goes into gluten and yeast, which i think is mostly irrelevant to the point at hand):
pita bread, as opposed to normal bread is a flat disc and not a lump of dough. also, it is baked at high heat for 5 minutes, and not at medium heat for longer. the heat makes the water and carbon dioxide (generated by the yeast) expand. in bread there are often slits in the crust to allow the bread to expand slowly without ripping the crust randomly.
in pita bread, the high heat makes the crust stiffen immediately and preserves the flat shape right away. when the heat gets inside the pita bread, it starts evaporating the water and expanding the carbon dioxide generated by the yeast and tries to expand. this creates a 'baloon' of air that doesn't rip the crust but holds the two sides of the disk apaart, until those get baked too, preventing reattachment.
i'll refine the recipe a little and then post it here, too.
29.01.05
memphis's oldest restaurant
foreign films are great. they're so subtle.
but really, life's more precise than any script you can write. so let's hear it for cinema verité.
here's a short clip (hi-res, lo-res) that yours truly shot and edited, and it reminds me that it is the high level of conversation with my friends that keeps my mind sharp.
if you prefer size over quality, there's also a hi-res version that's a little grainier.
much of what you see and hear can be attributed to the fact that we just spent a night (not) sleeping in the car to save on hotel bills.
and the funny thing is that just because it's in a foreign language, these things are sometimes considered high art. if you ask me - 'y tu mama tambien' is basically this, in spanish.
Sat, 29 Jan 2005 23:09
charming! i'm glad to see that israeli men are no different from american men in this regard.
- cynthia
Sun, 30 Jan 2005 12:01
I think we would have had the same conversation even if we had gotten a good night's sleep.
- udi
Mon, 31 Jan 2005 13:33
and yes this would probably win the oscar for best foreign short, if there was such a category. the cake, of course, is a metaphor for ... something exotic and foreign.
- cynthia
Mon, 31 Jan 2005 19:53
*LOL* Saddest Funniest thing I've seen/heard all week. And yet, I'd still
- ady
robot stories panel at harvard
on thursday i'll be participating in a panel discussion at harvard following a screening of 'robot stories', a movie that i really liked back in the days.
the details are: thursday feb.3 4:30pm, pound hall 102.
i wonder if a second screening will be as impressive, the discussion should be fun nonetheless. chatting about how robots are going to change our lives has been a favorite pastime since homo sapiens started walking the face of the earth.
people tell me to wear a turtleneck and grow a goatie, but i'm not sure i can pull #2 off in time.
28.01.05
no dress code in auschwitz
The vice president, however, was dressed in the kind of attire one typically wears to operate a snow blower.
26.01.05
blood on your hands
and more in the advice department: the stunning israeli connection. for $129 fight like an israeli.
Here's what's up: These fighting secrets have NEVER been revealed before to anyone outside the Israeli Special Forces compounds. Nir has agreed to share them because, first, he created this special system himself. It's mostly his. (The Israeli army begged him to stay and continue teaching, but he had other plans after his long and distinguished service.) And second... Nir (along with so many other front-line veterans) realizes it is past time for Americans to learn how to fight.
via jesus' general
Thu, 27 Jan 2005 02:21
Look at the url for the traditional jewish culture
- yoad
Thu, 27 Jan 2005 02:22
Sorry here it is:
http://www.abirwarriorarts.com/bio.htm
- yoad
Thu, 27 Jan 2005 12:46
yoad, that's one of the funniest sites I've ever seen.
- udi
Thu, 27 Jan 2005 12:50
seriously, is this for real? he seems to know his moves! i didn't even know that there was a traditional jewish martial artform. i thought we always won because of god.
- guy
what is god's last name, then?
25.01.05
gunslinging robots to iraq
AP has a story about a teleoperated robotic vehicle to be deployed in iraq.
they already scored a 10 out of 10 in my book by using the silliest acronym since 'USA PATRIOT Act' (Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism). this one's called SWORDS, short for Special Weapons Observation Reconnaissance Detection System.
and yeah, 'there are no letters to write home if they meet their demise in battle.'
via juliaset.
polar express - fascist, uncanny but great action
also, and my female accomplice concurred, it's definitely a male movie, not a chick-flick (hey - there's even a sentence there saying 'you're looking for a girl? ha! ain't we all?').
i loved the special effects, and the sound design was brilliant. whenever the hundreds of tons of steel almost skidded into a huge frozen rock, my testosterone made me a very happy person. it made me want to (quoting an old lover of mine) kill a large animal and carry it home over my blood stained shoulder.
Tue, 25 Jan 2005 11:20
yes, definitely not a chick flick. while you were soaring on testosterone i was wanting to run for cover.
- cynthia
Sat, 23 Dec 2006 12:35
How is it a fascist movie?
How does a Christmas movie come out to be fascist?
- Ryan
Sun, 24 Dec 2006 17:13
if you watch the movie and read the links from this post, you'll understand.
- guy
24.01.05
replaced old motd
fuck 'i love you'. my favorite three words are 'you were right'
22.01.05
the blizzard of '05
this morning the snow was piled up to my chest when i walked out. last night i stood out the blizzard with some good company, chai, mulled wine, and an overdose of chocolate cake and other pastries.
i also learned about the blizzard of '78. now that the sox won the championship, i guess it's the most salient agony in new england's collective memory.
the city is beautiful today. my own pictures to follow soon.
update: thanks to alea and her trusty powershot, here are the pictures of this morning, from where i was standing. my favorite one:
from all the snow being blown up by the wind, you can't even see the sun.
Sun, 23 Jan 2005 19:11
sweet. last night i was wishing i had someone to get snowed in with.
- cynthia
Sun, 23 Jan 2005 23:05
i wish for that on most nights. last night I actually turned a potential someone down.
- udi
Mon, 24 Jan 2005 00:58
I actually have a certificate at my parent's house that I am a proud survivor of the blizzard of '78. One of my most valued childhood treasures.
- vlvl
21.01.05
dear candidate
my old friend ori, to say it as he would, 'is a funny guy'.
he has just finished his nyt cited ph.d thesis, and is on the job market for a teaching position.
jaded by one too many rejection letter (all from ivy league institutions, i might add), he wrote the one rejection letter to end them all.
had me (and some of my captive audience) laughing in tears today:
Dear Candidate,
Thank you for your interest in the position with our group. We enjoyed meeting with you and learning about your background at our recent round of interviews.
This year, we have an unusually small and not very competitive applicant pool. That said, the Search Committee has reviewed your application and discussed your case, and we are less than unimpressed with your work. While your interests seem perfect for us, and while we are desperate for people in your field of research, you simply did not make the cut.
While we are always willing to make great compromises and accept mediocre -- and even weak -- candidates, we decided to not include your application for the next round of interviews. Such decisions are, typically, hard to make. Fortunately, in your case, the decision was easy, and the Committee voted unanimously. You did not come even close to being seriously considered.
We want to emphasize that it is the low quality of your work, and not of your character, that the Committee was put off by. However, it would make some sense for you to take this also as a personal criticism. Please interpret this as a clear indication of a lack of enthusiasm for both your research and your future prospects.
We wish you success in your career search.
Sincerely,
Search Committee Chair
19.01.05
keyflake - ascii art
the short story, i didn't win the simplicity snowflake-a-thon this afternoon. not even close.
this was my entry for the simplest program creating the most beautiful snowflake.
if you can, it would be great to spread the word about the snowflake, i really think it's a good way to make snowflakes with almost no code if you ever need to.
Thu, 20 Jan 2005 09:38
The best flake is created when you write: "A slumber did my spirit seal"
- incog
two links of the day
Wed, 19 Jan 2005 17:28
is that second click supposted to be a broken link?
- cynthia
Wed, 19 Jan 2005 17:44
nope, it used to link to costco selling an original picasso. i guess it was sold.
- guy
more miniature house
oh, and next time i'm going for a square simple house with no towers or any such bullshit. because that roof was really a mean motherfucker. the seemingly nicely located 4 corners do not define a plane. close to the tower the roof is almost vertical, while at the other end it's much more horizontal. i'm thinking of maybe adding a rain pipe along the edge to tie it together a bit.
18.01.05
and what color shoes was he wearing?
in the most recent interview with el presidente, the washington post exhibits some of the finest journalism for the blind:
Sitting at the head of a long conference table in a cabin at the front of the presidential plane, Bush wore a blue Air Force One flight jacket with a red tie and crisp white shirt.
safe trip
there's few things that annoy me as much as the general consensus of paranoia that's the staple of existance here, and the worst part is that it's spreading all over the world, where 'safety first' becomes the undisputed axiom of what's important in life.
i much prefer the high-risk but worthwhile approach.
particularily unnerving is the insistance of people in the u.s to wish their fellows a 'safe trip', where in every other language i know of people wish each other a 'good trip'. but here it's like - i don't care if you enjoy yourself, just don't die on me, please!
knowing that pet peeve of mine, my friend zoz forwarded me the following quote, 'from george carlin's latest book, 'when will jesus bring the pork chops?'':
go george!
always having something bad to say, however, i must point out that that 'creepy' is also one of my least favorite word in american english. not as bad as 'sketchy', but still.
17.01.05
high-risk but worthwhile
by now it's no secret that media lab europe shut its doors and operations.
this was communicated to the media lab community in a short, but precise email, which had a closing line that can be described as nothing less than brilliant; fitting to sum up many of our lives' failures:
From the beginning, it was a high-risk, but worthwhile venture.
thanks to ori for pointing this out to me.
how to not do compositing
this month i'm helping out with a stop-motion compositing project here at m.i.t. yesterday i took a shot at designing and building a miniature apartment building for the set.
as part of the production email exchange, i got this link with the comment: 'if you'd like to see an example of how *not* to do compositing of live-action people into a non-live-action world, watch the trailer'.
very true.
Fri, 18 Jan 2008 12:53
I'd love to hear what your criticism is! Email me at dennis@matterworks.com, and I'll happily send you a copy of the movie so you can judge it at least in a well-compressed SD format. It's amazing how hard it is to get good, professional criticism. Everyone "loves" it (or not) but nobody can back up their opinion with useful criticism! Do you feel the mattes aren't clean enough? That the surrealism of the bg pulls you out of the moment? That the lighting is distracting? You don't like the genre in general? The performances don't grab you? It sounds like you know what you're talking about, so please email me your thoughts. I discovered this blog because enough people have been clicking the link to my site that it shows up in my tracker. Thanks! Den
14.01.05
germanium, my ass
seriously, i'm doing some real work today. collecting the collective knowledge on my way to a blissful ph.d - it's not my fault that, in the process, i stumble across gems like electron band structure in germanium, my ass, by lucas kovar.
Results
Check this shit out (Fig. 1). That's bonafide, 100%-real data, my friends. I took it myself over the course of two weeks. And this was not a leisurely two weeks, either; I busted my ass day and night in order to provide you with nothing but the best data possible. Now, let's look a bit more closely at this data, remembering that it is absolutely first-rate. Do you see the exponential dependence? I sure don't. I see a bunch of crap.
behaviorist lovemaking
steven pinker, in his mildly annoying 'the blank slate', cites an 'old joke among psychologists':
what did the behaviorist say after making love?
'it was good for you, honey. was it good for me, too?'
Fri, 14 Jan 2005 12:14
ha--i find it funnier that you call his book "mildly annoying" i know some women who would like to castrate pinker and burn his books in a bonfire.
- cynthia
13.01.05
2 gb of ipod
sidewalks
walking and sliding back home last night, i thought how american it is that everyone is responsible to clear the sidewalk in front of his own house from snow and ice. it's not the city's business, but instead the home owners' problem.
the result: a patchwork of clean and slippery sidewalks, with the poor pedestrian at the mercy of the citizens' laziness. in other words, the problem is totally unsolved because of the privatization, and you stand a good chance to slip and break an arm.
the reason is supposedly that the sidewalk is owned by the home owner, so the city shouldn't be cleaning up other people's mess.
good thing cleaning the roads of ice is not the home owners' responsibility, otherwise we would have cars crashing into trees whenever they drive by a vacant lot.
talking to someone about this, she asked me if in israel the city clears the snow from the sidewalks. that's a good question, and we'll investigate it the next time there's ice on the sidewalks in israel.
no wmd in iraq
the washington post reports that the search for wmd in iraq has officially ended.
with a whimper.
Four months after Charles A. Duelfer, who led the weapons hunt in 2004, submitted an interim report to Congress that contradicted nearly every prewar assertion about Iraq made by top Bush administration officials, a senior intelligence official said the findings will stand as the ISG's final conclusions and will be published this spring.
basically the conclusion was reached in september of last year, but hey - that was really an inconvenient time to officially say things like that.
not that i think it would have swayed anyone to vote differently.
oh, and speaking of the i.s.g, it's always fun to revisit the fabulous thank you video bush sent them before the elections.
12.01.05
❤
nr. 1 turnoff in men or women: people who take themselves seriously.
on that note, cynthia did finally drag me to 'i ❤ huckabees' and she was right: i loved it. chances are that you will, too - but it's best not to know anything about the movie before you go (as it is with most movies).
it also made me inexplicably horny.
another tip - the strawberry something ice cream at j.p. licks, which was not only perfect for the weather, but i was also allowed to take into the movie by the nice and regulation-ignoring staff at the somerville theater.
Thu, 13 Jan 2005 07:56
i don't think it's so inexplicable, all that mud and meaninglessness...
- cynthia
women's parking
one of the funniest things i saw on this trip is that they have established women's parking spots in germany. the idea is that women can park close to the elevators so they won't be raped on the way to their car, which really sounds much more like an american idea than a german one. naturally, it sparks a host of jokes ("these parking places are also wider"), and i found the sign, well, hilarious. reminds me of the women-only train cars in india.
11.01.05
new apple products
it's that time of the year again. apple's new line of products this time around is aimed at all the people who look at dell and say 'but dell is so cheap and apple is so expensive' while looking only at the bright red "$500" icon without reading the specs. i've used my grandma's new super-cheap celeron and let me tell you, it's not a pretty sight. a one-year-old, clean computer that takes forever to boot and about 90 seconds to open a new i.e window.
so personally, i wouldn't touch a $500 desktop, but then again i'm with the odd people who think that waiting 2 minutes for every nontrivial action on your p.c is a dramatic decrease in quality of life.
having used other people's windows x.p and internet explorer for most of my trip, i realized however that most people don't care waiting that much.
in other news, the rumours that apple have a competing word processor in store that microsoft (who is the nr.1 software developer for mac o.s) doesn't like at all, and apple is just waiting for the right moment to release, was also true. apple and m.s have been playing nice for a while, but i guess that's over.
judging by keynote, which i've been using over powerpoint in the last few months, it may well be that i can finally stop using m.s word, the last crappy program on my applications menu, forever.
also there's a new cheap mp3 player from the company that taught the rest what an mp3 player should be like. here, i'm much less than excited. it looks like nothing more than a glorified cheap player building on the ipod brand. it doesn't even have the cool thumbwheel that's so convenient to use. and seriously, it's kind of scary how they play up the shuffle feature. i mean, what's the big deal? shuffling songs? are they just trying to hide the fact that their playes does not have a display?!?
i like the fact that you can have it download random 240 songs every time you plug it in to your computer for recharging. that's pretty minimalist right there. plug into your computer, then into your ears. repeat.
oh, and it's tiny.
Tue, 11 Jan 2005 21:00
I forgot all about the new releases today until now. this is great stuff. I hope there'll be many more switchers now, though I have to say I'm sort of doubtful that apple's market share will increase considerably.
- udi
Wed, 12 Jan 2005 06:30
you gotta wonder - there's not a single person i know who switched and ever looked back. that's some pretty good customer satisfaction right there. i agree with you though, but it beats me what makes it so unsuccessful then?
- guy
09.01.05
socialist dysfunction
trying to post my comment on the previous blog post discussion, my bloodhound-y spam filter wouldn't let me. i had to look at the log to find out why: i used the work 'socialist' in the post, which includes the illegal string 'cialis'.
to quote yariv: 'can you imagine how much of the current socialist agenda is blocked all around the world?'
seriously!
no wonder socialism died when the internet started. imagine there was a you-know-what (don't want to attract any more spam) drug called 'pitalis'. that would be the end of the free market...
08.01.05
post pioneer generation
this week i've fallen back in love with tel aviv, and the modest, simple house that is the site of this historic occasion is characteristic of what i love about the city. not a huge amphitheater, but a small dwelling. not huge malls, but small cafes. not collosal t.g.i fridays but hole-in-the-wall hummus bars who serve only one thing, and never thought of printing a menu.
Sat, 8 Jan 2005 21:03
loved this post. loved it.
- ady
Sat, 8 Jan 2005 23:45
you know I love tel aviv. it's my one and only home. still, I'm troubled by this post. it's hard for me the revel in the wonder that is the state of israel - the realization of the zionist vision - while another people is still being opressed and killed in its name. those same people who declared our independence on Rothchild blvd. back in may 1948, went on to command the fources that soon took over any piece of arab land that they could get their hands on. I think we have a long way to go before we can be proud of we have going there.
- udi
Sun, 9 Jan 2005 01:00
many bad deeds where done during the establishment of the state of Israel. many israelis don't see it or prefer to ignore it. idealistic self-portrayal is still widely present and there's an excess of nostalgia for partially-invented narratives. having said that, let's leave the black and white view of the world to Bush and his think-alikes. people and nations are not either completely evil or good. it is possible to acknowledge shameful parts of one's history without nullifying it.
- Shai
Sun, 9 Jan 2005 01:23
self-flagellation... and a very narrow and one sided view of history.... give me idealistic self-portrayal any day. We've got anough battles to fight outside our own four walls.
- ady
Sun, 9 Jan 2005 03:58
ouch, i didn't even think that this romantic post would spark a political debate.
naturally, i'm aware of the moral difficulty on which our country was founded, but i didn't feel that i went either way on this one.
i just loved the feeling that not-so-long ago there was a really creative and courageous bunch that gave up material comfort for a new simple, socialislt, romantic dream - and many of the things i didn't like about tel aviv (the measly architecture, the sense of temporariness, the carelessness) i suddenly saw in this new light of a 'new world' being created, where people just buy/create what they need. it was the modesty i loved. it was also inspired
by a movie about consumerism i saw a few days ago.
and about self-flagellation - i would call it 'critical thinking', 'not accepting things at face value', and 'swimming against the stream' - laudable properties that, while always in the fringe, have saved human lives so often. there's nothing wrong with that.
- guy
06.01.05
conspicuous consumption
a plug for my old-time friend ori heffetz, whose thesis was described in the new york times today.
05.01.05
no need
not getting married seems to be the trend around me these days. people are having kids, living together - but don't tie the proverbial knot. the ones that do often choose a minor ceremony instead of the usual $40,000 fanfare affair.
and honestly? why bother?
talking about non-marriage with some friends here recently, i remembered something my old landlady once told me. when i first signed the lease with her, i was very surprised at how informal it was. the whole thing was one page without much legalese and it just sort of sketched out an agreement and put our names together.
when i asked her - 'is this the whole lease? are there not going to be items concerning this and that and the other?' she - a 85 year old woman by then - replied:
'with honest people you don't really need a lease to start with; and with crooks, no lease in the world is going to save you.'
what do you believe is true?
I believe, but cannot yet prove, that acquiring a human language (an oral or sign language) is a necessary precondition for consciousness.
Wed, 5 Jan 2005 08:22
hey i almost linked to that yesterday and i almost sent it to you! but i didn't have the energy to go through all of them looking for something to cite.
- cynthia
04.01.05
the army dealing with civilians?
couldn't help but smirk when i heard one of the settlers' spokesmen on israeli radio this morning, bitching about the supposedly imminent evacuation of settlements by the army as part of the disengagement plan.
as part of this latest political development, there is a lot of talk in israel about some right-wing soldiers refusing to follow orders if they are commanded to evacuate jewish settlers from gaza.
i don't have the precise quote but he said something to the effect of "it's simply wrong to put the army in charge of what is obviously a police job. the army should fight the enemy and not do policing jobs dealing with civilians. there can only be a disaster if we have the army dealing with civilians, since they're trained to kill enemies and not to deal with a civilian unarmed population."
(sidenote: i would be interested to hear what percentage of gaza settlers is unarmed).
as they say in hebrew: good morning, eliyahu! the army is not equipped to deal with civilians?
who would have thought?
in a similar story, there are many banner ads around jerusalem that say that population transfer is a violation of human rights. again, as opposed to the last 30 years, this time the settlers are the ones funding these ads. cute political stand coming from a group who - at least partially - was an avid proponent of transfer when it was the arab population who was in line for the one way ticket to elsewhere.
03.01.05
aceh before and after
these two areal photographs from bbc news paint a very tangible picture of the power of h2o.
use filters on the right to see additional content by month or category
content here by guy hoffman .. as seen times since march 2004
Mon, 31 Jan 2005 01:39
very cool.
- udi