Have I vanished?

Not that anyone really cares, but no I haven't. I have submitted my first draft of introduction to my tutor, and recieved no response (doh). And I am going to be published! In ACM journals - very prestigious and remarkable. Which makes me feel much better about life.

Which is good, because work - as in any part of IT retail business - is a challenge at the moment.

Cloud computing

Hey -there's a new buzz-word! It involves using remote servers to process your requirements on. Of course, it is not a new idea - mainframes used to do this when I started in the business. But even on PCs, the idea is not completely new - the world community grid has been exploiting a similar principle ( although very different technological solution ) for many years.

Which makes me wonder what would happen if a WCG agent were to access a cloud network? Or a similar sort of agent that was programmed to utilise a good proportion of the computing power available to it? I presume that it would suddenly become very productive! OK, probably not, but if your available computing resource is ( effectivly ) unlimited, there are applications that will take advantage of this. And not all are made by Microsoft.

The point ( as there is always a point )? Firstly, new ideas are rarely new, just newly developed and skinned. Which I don't mind as long as they are not sold as radical new concepts in computing. We have not had any of these for a very long time.

Secondly, introducing new ideas, new means of doing things sounds very good, but they will always have an impact on, and be impacted by, existing technologies and approaches. Nothing that is done is in a vacuum - it all has to fit into the context of the existing paradigm. Even if, as does occasionally happen, it ends up changing the paradigm.

Station announcements

Why are they so bad? Why do they not give you the information that you need? I need to know which train will get me to my destination quickest. Instead of telling me this they give a whole lot of irrelevant information ( the timetabled departure, the final destination ). And out of this confusing set of information about various trains, I have to calculate which train I think is the best for me, as does everyone else.

And using the timetabled departure time and final destination as the key reference sort of works, until there are two trains with the same information. Then, to announce that the 08:16 to Moorgate is going to be late is meaningless, as there are two trains that might be late. So rather than clarifying the situation, it just makes things more obscure.

Now with all of the improvements that they have made to station announcements, why do they till not just tell me what I want to know?

The importance of chatter

Having read a lot from chicks-sent-me-high about the importance of flow and the ability to focus on a task without being disturbed, I was interested this week to read in Donald Normans book "Things that make us smart" about the importance on chatter - the background discussion that often happens in an office, most of which is seen as unwanted noise that distracts from the focus you are looking for. According to Norman, this chatter - much of the details of which are irrelevant to us and we filter out - is important for giving us the overview, the scope the context in which things are happening. So, for example, pilots in communication with the airport control tower perform better when they can hear all of the controllers discussions, because they get something of an image of the skies around them.

So having, as we currently do, quiet times in the office is undoubtedly productive in many ways, but it is also important to appreciate the significance to productivity and working of the chatter - be it verbal or email - that is a normal part of the office environment.

Why men shouldn't be ordained

Unashamedly pinched from various other places:

10. A man’s place is in the army.

9. For men who have children, their duties might distract them from the responsibilities of being a parent.

8. Their physical build indicates that men are more suited to tasks such as chopping down trees and wrestling mountain lions. It would be “unnatural” for them to do other forms of work.

7. Man was created before woman. It is therefore obvious that man was a prototype. Thus, they represent an experiment, rather than the crowning achievement of creation.

6. Men are too emotional to be priests or pastors. This is easily demonstrated by their conduct at football games and watching basketball tournaments.

5. Some men are handsome; they will distract women worshipers.

4. To be ordained pastor is to nurture the congregation. But this is not a traditional male role. Rather, throughout history, women have been considered to be not only more skilled than men at nurturing, but also more frequently attracted to it. This makes them the obvious choice for ordination.

3. Men are overly prone to violence. No really manly man wants to settle disputes by any means other than by fighting about it. Thus, they would be poor role models, as well as being dangerously unstable in positions of leadership.

2. Men can still be involved in church activities, even without being ordained. They can sweep paths, repair the church roof, and maybe even lead the singing on Father’s Day. By confining themselves to such traditional male roles, they can still be vitally important in the life of the Church.

1. In the New Testament account, the person who betrayed Jesus was a man. Thus, his lack of faith and ensuing punishment stands as a symbol of the subordinated position that all men should take.

The point? Just because you can argue for something doesn't make it right.

Can you help

If anyone can help me with my research, it would be much appreciated.

I am now into the focus group section, and need participants. Please check out this, and let me know if you can assist. Thank you.

David Blaine - get a job

The latest "stunt" by David Blaine has finished this week. He was supposed to hang upside down for 60 hours.

He didn't of course - he came down regularly for checks and toilet. He said "You don't expect me to pee on myself, do you" - well no, there are plenty of other people who will do that. But he didn't do what he said he was going to, and what he did do was tedious. And yet people pay to watch him? He makes money from being that boring?

So I have a suggestion for his next stunt. He works in an office for 45-50 hours in a week. He has people demanding things from him, he has a workload that he can't expect to get through. And he has an hours commute morning and evening - except for the days when the trains run late, when it is longer. Just a week, though, as any longer would be cruel, and I realise that he would need a few weeks to prepare and several weeks afterwards to recover.

Of course, this is what some of us do regularly. Its called having a job. And it is a whole lot more challenging than most of Mr Blains other "stunts".

Just how wide is my area of study?

I have just looked up another book I need, in the UCL library. I thought it might be somewhere slightly unusual, as it is an Edward Tufte, and really should be in "design" or suchlike.

My first set of books came from Engineering, Geography and Computer Science, which at least were all in the Science library. Three different floors, but then I needed the workout. So where is the Tufte book? Archeology. Ok, it is called Beautiful Evidence, because it deals with the visual presentation of data, but why archeology? What train of events led them to getting this book, and didn't drive the science department in any form to get it?

I am so glad that the catalogue makes it simple!

Sometimes people get it right.

I have joined the library at UCL, to provide me with some technical books. Boring, I know, but it has to be done, and the science library is walking distance from work - I can get there, get books out and get back in a lunchtime.

Last week, I looked up some books from the online catalogue, wrote down the location details, went to the library and found the books quickly and easily. Obvious, simple, exactly as I should be able to do - finding books in a library is an obvious thing to do. But I was pleasantly surprised, and I thought it was worthy of note. It is sad that such things are so rare that they are worth noting. But that is how things should be. I think.

The Motor Show

Last Saturday, I went to the British Motor Show, which was a great day out, a fun and enjoyable trip, concluding with the Meatloaf concert.

I saw an F40 being driven, which is my favorite car ever. Even though it is 20 years old, I still believe that it is the peak of automotive engineering. The combination of performance and looks has not, in my opinion, ever been matched. Beautiful and brutal, it was a joy to watch.

Which does not do much for my green credentials.

Which is why the most interesting car I saw was the Lightning. I love the idea of electric cars, they have a lot of potential to revolutionise driving and our use of oil. However, most of them look and drive like milk floats, and so will never catch on with people who enjoy driving powerful cars, who enjoy the thrill of speed and performance. And whether you approve or not, until electric cars can start to satisfy the petrolheads, they will not make a difference our driving habits. Which is where the Lightning comes in - it is an electric driven sports car, with performance that would keep most people happy. Maybe not yet the F40 drivers, but it is a big step along the way, and I hope that the technology will both develop to make them even better, and also trickle down to give perfomant, reasonably prices cars. That are not milk floats.

It is very easy to tell peopel what they should have and shouldn't have. But if we want to win peoples hearts - and HCI work is very much about winning people to your applications - we have to acknowledge what people want ( not preaching about what they should have - there is plenty of that from everywhere else ), but do it in a good and positive way. Give people what they are asking for, doing it in the way that is should be done. Give them a Lightning.