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sticky scratch

Saturday, January 28, 2006

Quote of the Day

A vitória tangencial de Cavaco Silva à primeira volta

Helena Pinto - deputada do Bloco de Esquerda

Saturday, January 21, 2006

CSS Zen Garden


A demonstration of what can be accomplished visually through CSS-based design. Select any style sheet from the list to load it into this page.

The Road to Enlightenment

Littering a dark and dreary road lay the past relics of browser-specific tags, incompatible DOMs, and broken CSS support.

Today, we must clear the mind of past practices. Web enlightenment has been achieved thanks to the tireless efforts of folk like the W3C, WaSP and the major browser creators.

The css Zen Garden invites you to relax and meditate on the important lessons of the masters. Begin to see with clarity. Learn to use the (yet to be) time-honored techniques in new and invigorating fashion. Become one with the web.
So What is This About?

There is clearly a need for CSS to be taken seriously by graphic artists. The Zen Garden aims to excite, inspire, and encourage participation. To begin, view some of the existing designs in the list. Clicking on any one will load the style sheet into this very page. The code remains the same, the only thing that has changed is the external .css file. Yes, really.

CSS allows complete and total control over the style of a hypertext document. The only way this can be illustrated in a way that gets people excited is by demonstrating what it can truly be, once the reins are placed in the hands of those able to create beauty from structure. To date, most examples of neat tricks and hacks have been demonstrated by structurists and coders. Designers have yet to make their mark. This needs to change.

CSS Zen Garden

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

myFortune

Now we'll finally be able to combine the security and ease of use of Windows with the flexibility and low cost of Apple hardware!
somewhere in Slashdot's comments

Mac x86 arrived!


It's not a rumor or a thought, or any kind of small talk, it's a fact. It has been announced by Steve Jobs and you can buy them on Apple's official website.
A new iMac and a new laptop with Intel processors have arrived. This is a very important day for computer production world but that's not all... when you buy one of these computers you won't get one but two core processors. That's right, Apple adopted Intel Core Duo to get "up to four times the horsepower of PowerBook G4" (from Apple website).
Many interesting new features also arrived with these new computers as the stunning graphic card (ATI X1600 128 or 256 mb) specially on the laptops (now know as MacBooks). Design was also improved (MacBooks are now 1" thin) and special features like Power Adapter with MagSafe connector, iSight and Apple Remote were also included.

After all the huge party of the most revolutionary notebook in Mac history, i would point some things which are not so bright or clear.
1) First, it is not yet clear if MacBook's Pro and iMac with Intel processors do make possible to run any x86 software natively like Windows XP and FreeBSD. There is no technical information that makes this a problem but some say it is not going to be possible to make support cheaper and the image of Apple cleaner since many people would throw stones against Apple for problem with Windows OS and so on...
Truth is, there is no clear answer to this question which is really important for many people (like me) that want to buy a new computer.
2) Well, though current prices are excepted to decrease with time, still they are high to many pockets. Not so high if we consider its features and the trademark "Apple".
3) There is no pcmcia slot. Allthough you can find a expresscard/34 slot, still pcmcia is very used on laptops like in 3G cards.
4) There is no dial-up modem. Here you have alternative using, for example, Apple USB modem (which may expect a good selling period) but that has a price.
5) Firewire is not 800 but 400. Not a problem, but certainly not an advantage.
6) Superdrive (dvd burner) is not dual-layer. That should be already mandatory.
7) No S-video connection. You have DVI instead but you still lose a lot of freedom to easily connect your computer to a TV. Here you also have an alternative by using a DVI to S-video adapter, however there is an extra cost for that.

I am almost sure that is only a matter of time until become possible to run Windows on MacBook Pro. At least, Windows Vista should not offer much problems since it is supposed to support EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) which is pointed to be one of the most strong reasons for these releases not to run Windows XP. I'm also very confident that some of the other topics refered above will going to be improved on future releases.

The release took place few hours ago, so it's early to take more conclusions than this, however in overall these machines have an huge potential (specially on performance matters) and definitely represent a big threat to competition.

P.S.: this article has been updated 1 time.
References:
Apple official Website
Slashdot article

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

XE.com

We at XE.com have a simple mission: to facilitate global commerce. Since 1993, we have grown to become the world's most popular currency site by developing the powerful and efficient currency services that the new global economy demands. In 2002, we launched XEtrade, our discount on-line foreign exchange payment system.

Projecto Ockham


Este site dedica-se a divulgar e discutir evidências científicas disponíveis sobre vários fenômenos supostamente "paranormais" ou "sobrenaturais" e fatos erroneamente divulgados como científicos. Nossa intenção é estimular a análise racional ao invés da crença cega em informações de origem duvidosa.

Saturday, January 07, 2006

Making a Web Browser in 5 minutes using Mono and Glade


See for your self, it is not the future but the present. Stetic is a project still getting born but with a great potential. This GUI designer for GNOME is being written in C# by Dan Winship and really hits an important flaw of the development tools of GNU/Linux.
On this presentation you can see a little demonstration of the power of tools like Mono and Glade combined. With the approach of Windows Vista it is necessary to work on this kind of tools to make the life easier to the Open Source Community. I am sure that this is an example of a new Programming Generation where huge projects become child's play.


For full details visit his own webpage.

Thursday, January 05, 2006

A Ler


http://www.shoutwire.com - Este blog é para mim uma grande fonte de informação, não só pelo interesse da maioria das suas entradas mas pela sua extrema actualização que se torna até, difícil de acompanhar. Apesar de ser generalista tem uma grande vertente científica e tecnológica o que faz dele um sítio para conhecer as últimas novidades e inventos.
É ainda possível, filtrar os principais temas de interesse de modo a personalizar o blog ao gosto do utilizador.

Earth as seen from Space




Earth as Seen from Mars
5/31/05
On its 449th martian day, or sol (April 29, 2005), NASA's Mars rover Opportunity woke up approximately an hour after sunset and took this picture of the fading twilight as the stars began to come out. Set against the fading red glow of the sky, the pale dot near the center of the picture is not a star, but a planet -- Earth.

Earth appears elongated because it moved slightly during the 15-second exposures. The faintly blue light from the Earth combines with the reddish sky glow to give the pale white appearance.

The images were taken with Odyssey's panoramic camera, using 440-nanometer, 530-nanometer, and 750-nanometer color filters. In processing on the ground, the images were shifted slightly to compensate for Earth's motion between one image and the next.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Cornell/Texas A&M


http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/mer/images.cfm?id=1685

A Ler

Pedro Santos é um jovem que, tal como eu, se interessa muito por computadores e informática em geral. Penso que, sem fugir muito à verdade, tem como principal interesse a programação, em particular o desenvolvimento de jogos. Recentemente, lançou um projecto denominado "Orion's Belt", um jogo que utiliza a web como plataforma onde qualquer pessoa pode entrar e participar.
Neste momento, tenho grandes expectativas quanto ao seu trabalho no projecto "Midgard" que se trata de uma ferramenta RAD para suporte ao desenvolvimento de aplicações Web e é o seu projecto de final de curso.
Finalmente, deixo aqui a referência ao seu site, que além de muito interessante e completo é também frequentemente actualizado.