captsolo weblog

I have not written lately about the things I have been developing myself, been involved with or that people around me have been doing. With so many things happening around I probably should.

Therefore I will write more on such hot topics as:

• SIOC - Semantically Interlinking Online Communities [ pronounce SIOC as "shock" !]

• SemperWiki - Semantic Personal Wiki

• ISWC 2005 - 4th International Semantic Web Conference

• ... and more ...

ISWC 2005 will start in one week time here in Galway and it is now a very hot preparation time. It will not get any less intensive once the conference starts, but it will get even more interesting.

If there are other things you want to ask or to read about, just ask. Hopefully I will have time to write it all [I am not a professional blogger, you know] and still have time for some beers.

Blogsavvy blog has an article "Multi user blog tools - overall ratings and reviews".

It lists and reviews 6 most popular multi-user blog tools and provides a visually attractive rating summary in terms of ease of use, functionality and future development.

Tools chosen for review are: [Drupal, Elgg, Manila, Movable Type, WordPress MultiUser and pLog].

WordPress Multi User by Donncha O'Caoimh tops the ratings list.

It would also be interesting to see how b2evolution compares with all the other as a multi-blog engine. In general I find b2evolution to have many interesting features while WP is stunning in its simplicity.

There are many, quite polarised opinions on what and how cool is Flock.

There are people saying it is the Next Big Thing (tm) and there are others who say it is not worth the hype. It is probably too early to tell - Flock is still raw.

Atrus writes - Flock is just a bunch of extensions:

" Flock =? theme + foxylicious + flickrfox + Deepest Sender

Granted, Firefox itself is mostly glue between various parts of Gecko and extensions ...
Speaking of Firefox, I'm disappointed by two of the big features for 1.5: <canvas> and SVG. "

Daniel thinks along the same lines:

" Personally, I'd love to be able to lay hands on all of the kick @ss features as regular extensions to firefox as opposed to having to get the Flock browser. "

So it is a sum of extensions. But maybe that is what people need?

Miss Rogue - " An extension? That's what I put in my hair. As a halfling (member of the technically clueless, but love the idea of it), I am a bit afraid of extensions. Give me the package or go away. "

There are valueble things in Flock, but those are not necessarily the ones that are most talked about. One of them is search. Benja comments :

" That the search field searches the recent history (and favorites) was the one thing I really liked about Flock, OTOH. "

That summarises what people are saying about Flock.

P.S. Flock does not work with b2evolution.

Title: "Flock - first impressions"
Originally uploaded by captsolo

First impressions:

• del.icio.us synch works - you can view your bookmarks in Flock and synch both ways
• flickr - there's a "top-bar" where you can enter a username and see his/her Flickr photos
• blogging - it has a blog editor, but it did not work for me

These are the basic integration features. There is also a "shelf" - a window that says "drop stuff here", but it did not seem to work at this point.

Conclusion: it has nice looks, but the "feel" is of a very early beta (as they say on the site) - some things do not work or feel weird. What I did like though were its "guess-work" features that makes some things easier:

• typing "captsolo" in the URL field was enough to make it go to this blog
• when typing in search field, it shows a number of choices from recent history and bookmarks

These last two features are nothing exceptional, but still very satisfying. But all in all it still has to mature.

I'd like to see a deeper integration of Flickr, ability to mark bookmarks private (and avoid synching them to the outside) and to view your contacts' Flickr images in the "top-bar" - and for it all to work well.

Flock - a "social browser" that is so talked about on Slashdot, Wired News and everywhere else has finally seen it's early developers release.

You can download it from the Flock developer's page:

• Download for Windows (7.3MB)
• Download for Mac OSX (9.4MB)
• Download for Linux (7.9MB)

What will be next?
A social semantic browser?

Get some good karma now - it's at US$ 5.50 and rising!
Use it (and what can you use them for?) on #joiito.

... as seen on eBay: 10 karma points on #joiito

Komentārs par tēmu pēdējais Robot Race:

????? ??? ??????????? Linux ? ?????? ?? Java ?????? ?? ????? ?? ???????? ????? 100 ??/?. ?????? ? ??? ???? ???????????? ?????????????? ????, ??? Java ?? ????????.

Pērles autors: Nazgul
Pastāstīja: Xeno

Laimīgais robots: "Tommy"

A couple of nice quotes from today's #swig chat.

Emacs

• 23:29 DanC > hoot... "emacs is a nice operating system, but it lacks a good text editor."
• 23:30 [GNU]> oh... i thought it is a kernel for a newsreader

Dan says the Emacs "OS vs. text editor" quote comes from "Flock Misconceptions and Holy Wars".

Ontologies for Publications

• bengee > for my use cases, mindswap's conference ontology combined with ebiquity and foaf/dc seems to cover most of what I need
• ...
• bengee > in an ideal world you could just pick whatever you want and the machines would to the rest for you...

Wish we were living in an ideal world...

I updated an earlier post on "GMail and Usability" with text about this "feature" and here is the error message itself:

Server Error

Gmail is temporarily unavailable.
Cross your fingers and try again in a few minutes.
We're sorry for the inconvenience.

How do you get it?
Easy - save email as a draft and try to print it.
Works every time.

If I followed the "try again" part then I'll be stuck in an infinite loop...

b2evolution Debian package has found it's way to Debian Mentors repository.
You may now start using it.

Thanks to Arnaud Guiton who created it.

b2evolution is a multi-lingual, multi-user, multi-blog publishing system written in PHP and backed by a MySQL database. It is distributed under GPL license.

Most importantly to me, it is the blog engine that I am using.

Wikipedia: b2evolution

Vai kāds var pateikt kas notiek ar Latvju Dainu elektronisko versiju?

Zinu, ka sen (kādus 10-15 gadus atpakaļ) tika sākts projekts tautasdziesmu "digitalizēšanai" un jau kādu laiku atpakaļ tika izveidots Virtuālais Dainu Skapis.

Bet tas jau ir noticis fakts. Vai mēs gūstam kāds papildus labumu no tā, ka tagad tautasdziesmas ir pieejamas elektroniskā formā un vai notiek tālāka attīstība, par pamatu izmantojot šos krājumus?

Vai arī projekts ir beidzies un visi guļ tālāk?

Eng: asking a question where the project of digitalising Latvian folk song collections stands now.

Eng: about the project for localisation of MoinMoin Wiki in Latvian language.

Skat. MoinMoin Wiki - Latvian Translation

Kā arī: Projekts "MoinMoin latviešu mēlē"

Šis noteikti ir mans šī mēneša pārsteigums - pavisam nejauši MoinMoin saitā atradu lapu LatvianTranslation, no kuras nosaukuma nav grūti saprast, kas tas ir MoinMoin Wiki latviskošanas projekts.

Galvenais, ka 2 no 3 projekta dalībniekiem ir labi pazīstami, bet klusē takš kā tādi partizāņi.

Latviešu valodas pareizības entuziastiem varētu būt interesanti iepētīt kā šajā projektā ir pārtulkoti būtiskākie termini:

• FrontPage - SākumLapa
• Wiki - Viki (latviešu valodā takš 'W' nav)
• ...

Pamatā visi tulkojumi izskatās jauki un labi.
Vienīgais, ko es nesaprotu, ir šis tulkojums:

• InterWiki - InerWiki (kamdēļ tā?)

Eng: this post is about a Semantic Web seminar and related activities in Latvia.

Šogad LU MII ir sākušies regulāri iknedēļas semināri par semantisko webu.

Mūsu mērķis ir paplašināt šo aktivitāšu pieejamību un ļaut no tam kautko iegūt arī tiem, kas nevar iesaistīties klātienē. Un, protams, sniegt papildus informāciju tiem, kas vēlas piedalīties vai uzzināt ko vairāk.

Sīkāka informācija:

Seminārs notiek katru trešdienu MII 414.telpā (Raiņa bulv. 29) plkst. 18:30 - 20:00.

- SemWeb LV Wiki
Tur var atrast vairāk informācijas gan par pašiem semināriem, gan par semantisko webu vispār.

- SemWeb LV mailing list
Sarakste par semantisko webu un semināriem. Parasti pēc semināriem tur var atrast nelielu atksiati par to, kas notikās un kas būs nākamreiz.

- Semināru konspekti
SemWeb LV semināru konspekti - tiesa, pēdējais konspekts tur vēl nez kādēļ nav parādījies.

Ja ir kādi jautājumi, komentāri, ieteikumi - rakstiet - centīšos atbildēt.

Tas ir labs sākuma punkts - ar reālu iespēju būt pirmajiem Baltijā, kas attīsta šo nozari.

Ir idejas papildus esošajiem sadarbības veidiem (wiki, mailing list) ieviest vēl jaunus, kas ļautu tur piedalīties plašākam cilvēku lokam. Dažas iespējas - forums, blogs, IRC kanāls.

Bet pamata infrastruktūra jau ir - reģistrējieties Wiki un runājiet par to, kas interesē. Wiki ir atsevišķa lapa JautajumiUnAtbildes, kurā var uzdot jautājumu arī nereģistrēti lietotāji (vismaz pagaidām var).

Saistīti raksti: FYI - SemWebLV [laacz.lv]

LETA: Nobela prēmiju ekonomikā piešķir par "spēļu teoriju"

Eng: Nobel prize in Economics gets awarded for research in Game Theory.

Stokholma, 10.okt., LETA--REUTERS. Nobela prēmiju ekonomikā šogad saņems izraēliešu zinātnieks Roberts Aumans un amerikāņu pētnieks Tomass Šellings par "spēļu teorijas analīzi", kas var palīdzēt risināt konfliktus uzņēmējdarbībā un tirdzniecībā, pirmdien paziņoja Zviedrijas Karaliskā zinātņu akadēmija.

"Spēļu teorija" ir zinātne par stratēģiju, kuras mērķis ir noteikt, kādas darbības dažādiem "spēlētājiem" - vai tie būtu tirdzniecības partneri, darba devēji, arodbiedrības, vai pat noziedzīgie grupējumi - ir jāveic, lai nodrošinātu sev labvēlīgāko rezultātu.

Šellings piemēroja spēļu teoriju pasaules drošības sfērai un bruņošanās sacensībai, kas attīstījās kopš pagājušā gadsimta 50.gadiem, savukārt Aumans veica "bezgalīgi atkārtojošos spēļu" analīzi, lai noteiktu, kāds iznākums var būt noturīgs laika gaitā.

"Šo jautājumu izpratne palīdz izskaidrot ekonomiskos konfliktus, tādus kā cenu kari un tirdzniecības kari, un atklāt, kāpēc dažas sabiedrības gūst labākus panākumus, pārvaldot vienus un tos pašus resursus," teikts akadēmijas paziņojumā.

It's probably the easiest thing in the world - go out to the nearest pub ("just for one pint") and you end up meeting people you know and stay there whole night (or until they close pubs in Ireland which is quite early anyway).

I mean - we went to the nearest place which is far from the city center - and yet ran into a bunch of people from FanSci society (NUIG Fantasy & Science Fiction Society). Was fun

NUI Galway website has beed redesigned.
How do you like it now?

Compare with an older version.

How to best integrate two ontologies?

We have developed a SIOC ontology to describe information on online community sites. It is aimed at connecting these sites together and allowing to infer relations between posts on different sites.

But now we have a question - how to integrate it with FOAF?

There are similar classes in both ontologies, e.g., sioc:User and foaf:Person. And there are a number of choices how to do it.

If you are interested and can help, please follow to a rdfweb-dev post "Integrating SIOC and RDF".

More info about SIOC, including links to its forums, mailing list and publications can be found on SIOC Project Page.

Un Dievs man teica:

BBC reports about what George W. Bush has allegedly said in a meeting at a 2003 Jordan summit. Out of the context this sounds strange (funny?) enough so that White House officials denied that Bush said this at all. Yet, people Bush was meeting with claim the opposite.

Mr Shaath said that in a 2003 meeting with Mr Bush, the US president said he was "driven with a mission from God".

"God would tell me, George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan. And I did, and then God would tell me, George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq... And I did.

"And now, again, I feel God's words coming to me, Go get the Palestinians their state and get the Israelis their security, and get peace in the Middle East. And by God I'm gonna do it."

Source: BBC News

?????? ????? ??????????? ???????, ?????? ?????.

??????? ? ???????????? ? ??????? ????:
- ?????, ???? ???? ???? ?? ????? ???? ?????????? ?????, ?????? ?????? - ????? ?? ???...

???????? ??????, ???? ????? ??? ?????????? ????? ? ??? ??????: "????? ?? ???"... ???????? ?????.. ??????? ??? ??????? ???.. ???? ??? ?????, ? ??? ??? ?????????? ?? ?????... ???????????? ? ???? ??? ???????- ???????..

???? ?????? - ???????, ?????? "????? ?? ???", ??????? ???... - ??????? ???????...

????????? ??? ?? ???????????? ??????? ???? ?????? ? ?????? ?????????? ? ??????, ????? ??????? ? ??????..
??? ??????????:
- ???????, ? ??? ??????
?? ??? ??? ????????:
- ?? ???? ??? ???, ?? ????? ???-?? ?????!!!

LateX Parser for MoinMoin Wiki

Lets you write wiki pages in LateX.
Might be handy to use a wiki for writing publications.

Design by Wiki

Using a Wiki for Enterprise Architecture Development

Skinning del.icio.us with Firefox and URIid

How to skin del.icio.us in Firefox using URIid extension and custom userContent.css

TiVo Community - letting users customize how TCF looks to them:

More on skinning the sites. Tries to make this a cross-browser functionality

Skining Apollo + Parotaļāsimies ar Laacz.lv stiliem?

Articles in Latvian about using URIid and userContent.css

And something for free:

CamStudio - freeware program to record screen activity in video

CamStudio is able to record all screen and audio activity on your computer and create industry-standard AVI video files and using it's built-in SWF Producer can turn those AVIs into lean, mean, bandwidth-friendly Streaming Flash videos (SWFs).

Komentāru autori - lūdzu mieru - komentāri tūlīt būs.

Šobrīd tiek moderēti visi komentāri.
Apnikuši jau spama kalni.
Komentārus pietiek uzrakstīt vienreiz, tie kļūs redzami vēlāk.

Bet ar jaunā b2evo 0.9.1 uzlikšanu, šķiet, spama daudzums ir jūtami samazinājies.
Ja tā, tad moderēšanu varētu ņemt nost.

... un tagad būtu jāapstiprina gaidošos komentārus ...

If you have ever wondered how to get Flickr post photos to b2evolution based blog you know that you won't find b2evo in flickr list of blog engines.

Then this HowTo should help you:

[ Flickr - how to set it up with b2evolution ]

Laacz ir pārgājis uz WordPress.

Bet man tomēr ļoti patika vecais dizains - tas bija viens no elegantākajiem saitiem, ko nācies redzēt. Jaunajam trūkst daļa vecās funkcionalitātes un fonti ar' ir visai nebaudāmi. Bet var jau būt ka visi ir tādi konservatīvi (es ar') un nevar pieņemt jaunumus. Šā vai tā - patīk vecais un viss!

[ Skatāmies kā izskatījās vecais laacz.lv ]

Būs interesanti paskatīties - kas notiks tālāk. Var jau to pašu WP pielāgot tā, ka funkciju un izskata ziņā izskatīsies kā vecais (to lācīša bildi augšā gan derētu atstāt). Bet nu ņemtne tur būs nevāja.

Gan jau laacz ir savi iemesli. Varbūt ka SPP pietrūka kas tāds, kas kļuva vajadzīgs (XMLRPC, ...). Varbūt vienkārši apnika ņemtne. Katrā ziņā interesanti - kāpēc?

P.S. Vēl daži komentētāji izteica biklu cerību ka SPP taps open-sourcots. Dzīvosim - redzēsim. Bet tad it kā nebūtu iemesla tagad migrēt uz WP...

P.P.S. Bet par to slinkumu un vecumu viņam taisnība. Ja tā nebūtu, ko tik nevarētu izdarīt!

Pikachu in Airport
Originally uploaded by captsolo.

Laacz recently posted about photoshopping contest from Worth1K to show what it would be if everyone in real life looked like anime heroes. I think the neatest of all was Pikachu.

In the picture above you can see what planes would be like in a Pikachu world.
Related: Anime bullet train

And more fun stuff:

Catch a glimpse of a safe and sexy protection for your iPod nano:
- iPod nano is stockings [stereo.lu]