Just read over at the Register that a CA appellate court has deemed the DeCSS code legal expression! Wearing my "got DeCSS?" shirt today to celebrate it (actually, was wearing the shirt any way 'cuz it was clean, but now it's in tribute to the prilim ruling ;-)

I use DeCSS on my laptop all the time to watch my Monty Python DVDs (the entire set ;-)

Anyway, not a real news update, just something I was excited about.

2001 Nov 7 (Wed), 17:33 Not a proper update at all...

Okay, my drive has all-but expired now... I have problems with it all the time.

Thankfully, my replacement drive (along with a few other items) has shown up and I can repair & upgrade my system.

I have been working on the new noink2 extensions we'll be using over at Tux4Kids. noRel is almost done (it should be ready by next Monday), and noContact (our anti-spam-bot device & general contact thingy) is very close as well. Probably going to have to take a day or two (or a weekend?) off to fix/rebuild my desktop.

Linus & Alan have agreed on Linux's VM, which is good news, I suppose. The thing is, the original ZDNet article makes it sound like they've been feuding over this or something. Well, as anyone who follows KT already knew, there really wasn't much of a feud. Linus changed the VM in the middle of a stable branch, Alan thought that wasn't the best idea, so they had divergent VMs in eachother's tree. This (which some people misinterpreted as a fork) actually led to some great comparisons & studies into which VM was better (such as this study). So, in the end, this "feud" turned out to be very good for Linux because we wound up getting a better more VM scrutiny than we otherwise would have.

Oh, and BTW.... I'm using Windows XP.... or maybe I'm just using the XP theme for IceWM ;-)

2001 Nov 13 (Tue), 10:02 ACK! PBBTH!

Okay, my HDD which I had been having problems with failed hardcore last week. I got my new HDD, and some other replacement equipment, but I have gotten way behind now since I am having to rebuild my desktop. I haven't checked my e-mail in about a week, so if anyone has tried to contact me recently, please bear with me until I get this issue resolved.

2001 Nov 17 (Sat), 13:18 More ACK PBBTH!

Well, now my system is set up again, but I cannot remember how I set up my e-mail on geekcomix.com.... Apparently I did some weird thing (probably for security reasons) and I can't get my e-mail working again! .... YEARGH!

Anyone trying to get a hold of me, please be patient. I promise I'll be better at backing things up in the future (actually, I was backing things up, but my settings files for KDE [in .kde/] were not a part of the backups... I didn't think things through and just treated .kde/ as desktop [eg background, screensaver, etc.] settings that'd be easily restored...)

2001 Nov 20 (Tue), 09:09 Not only... But Also... ACK! PBBTH!

Well, I sure hope people are reading this diary instead of trying to e-mail me, because I still haven't resolved all the issues I have been getting with my personal e-mail. If anyone really does need to get a hold of me, they can reach me at work (hart at physics dot arizona dot edu).

My inlaws are coming to visit tonight, they will be here for a few days (turkey day stuff). This means I may or may not have much chance until after Thanksgiving to fix whatever ails my connection.

Patience all ;-)

2001 Nov 28 (Wed), 12:12 Updates All Around

Okay, been a while, but I think I have all of my hardware issues solved. I never solved my e-mail troubles, but I have figured out that it was a mailer problem not my server or connection: KMail was trashing my e-mail headers, making them impossible to read or reply to. My solution? I've just switched to Mozilla Mail. I hate Mozilla Mail (well, it'd probably be okay if I hadn't been spoiled on KMail's awesome filter abilities ;-) but until I can solve this problem better, I'll just use it (it helps that their mailboxes are interchangable).

There has been more work by some of the Tux4Kids team members during my absense. Hats off to them! We will announce within a few days some of what's been happenning.

My inlaws came over the Turkey Day break, and that was fun. Cassie's brother Tony also came and we rented some games... so here's my thoughts on some of the titles we've rented (these are all PS2 titles):

• Silent Hill 2: Okay, so I've already rented this one recently... but I loved the game. Actually, the person who loved it the most (and this surprised me) was my wife. She totally got into this game and had to see a couple of the endings (there are 5). However, she was too freaked out to play it herself, so she made me do it. The endings we saw were "Leave" and "Rebirth". Can I just say that the final few bosses are really disturbing? The new options and items you can access the second time through the game are very kewl (the chainsaw kicks ;-) Anyone wanting to get this for me for Christmas should feel free ;-)
• Grand Theft Auto 3: Woah... this is one intense game. I never liked the previous GTA games, but this one was amazing. The graphics were top notch, the gameplay was excellent... But the real selling point for this game is the replayability! Most of the time when you have games that can be as open ended as this one, the gameplay takes it in the shorts... But in this game they did things right. Excellent title, I highly recommend it.... FOR ADULTS! This is not a game for kids or people who are overtly sensitive... this is a vile, nasty, horrible, "you-should-be-ashamed-at-yourself-for-playing-it" game. But it is so fun! ;-) Again, anyone wanting to get me a Christmas present should seriously consider this game ;-)
• Madden 2002: Okay, I hate football. I loathe it. I have, in the past, stomached football games because they can occassionally be fun. But Madden 2002 is a very impressive game. The graphics are incredible, the gameplay is rock-solid, and the depth is amazing. While I probably would never buy the game (unless it was very cheap) it is quite fun to play.

Anyway... more updates (project updates) to come soon...