HongPong-site

Hazardous glitches in system files found

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-03-07 21:28

This is some weird stuff. I found a whole bunch of system files with lots of garbage. This would affect compiling programs, which could explain why the compiler's been weird all along. Compiler said:
/usr/include/mach/exception_types.h:61:39: invalid suffix "s" on integer constant
/usr/include/mach/exception_types.h:61: error: stray '\10' in program
/usr/include/mach/exception_types.h:61:47: invalid suffix "R" on integer constant
/usr/include/mach/exception_types.h:61: error: stray '\352' in program
Meanwhile inside exception_types.h:

zW@ÜìÑôôifilÜìÇÆ?ËìÑôô9003ÜìÇÆ?ÙìÑôôA

Last week before spring break and the glass is half full!!!

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-03-07 19:38

I am eagerly looking forward to spring break this year. For the first time, I'll fly over the big pond to Europe and hang out with Nick Petersen in London for a week. That's this Friday.

During that time I'll leave the site turned on, and I'll probably find some time to post back to here, but it can't be frequent.

This week, I have several mid-term exams and a giant group paper to contend with, so I can't spend a great deal of time writing here.

On the plus side, I realized that the Apache server which comes with OS X has a built-in Perl module (mod_perl), but deactivated. The Perl module runs the site's Perl code much more quickly than a server without the module. To turn it on I just had to enable it in the configuration files and restart the server. *Bingo*, just like that my site's dynamic stuff runs about 3x-4x faster. It was really necessary, and I only put it off because I was too busy and I thought I would have to go through the mess of recompiling Apache. So far I am using Apple's default Apache server with no problems.

Richard Perle fired?!

Submitted by HongPong on Thu, 2004-03-04 04:28

The word is that Richard Perle got tossed on his butt from the Pentagon's Defense Policy Board, supposedly for calling for the firing of the Pentagon's in-house spy agency's chief. The agency, the DIA or Defense Intelligence Agency, is somewhat more towards the "rational" side of intelligence gathering. That is, they were not the ones principally responsible for silly WMD intelligence. Yet Perle blames them for messing it up.

Too much for Rummy, finally at long last.

Pat Buchanan predicted on the McLaughlin group on Sunday morning that he would not be the last kicked out before the election. Ahh Pat.

Further work on my site design

Submitted by HongPong on Tue, 2004-03-02 03:24

Right now my computer is compiling special image processing software called ImageMagick, which allows my MovableType website engine to generate thumbnails of pictures that I would put in an online gallery. Galleries, it still seems, are not foolproof to set up in MT. The compiler is bitching out right now... fortunately this site offers some help.

Additionally I am planning to add an instant website style switcher, so that you can change colors and text at the touch of a button.

Linx0rs fix0rd

Submitted by HongPong on Fri, 2004-02-20 23:04

I fixed the links on the right-hand side. They're now mostly the same as the old HongPong.com. Now that they're there, I'll go on to make some modifications. I have also been digging up more information on how to modify MovableType in various ways, so that I can have a nice image gallery and improved archive organization, as well as possibly some dynamic RSS (news push) content. It's been quite a week.

While looking around at some blogs considered the most well-designed, I see that a little attention to the delicate structure of style sheets can go a long way. Also there are some very well-designed galleries out there. There are news feed type setups. This is a journalist who has been around Iraq some-and evidently uses the same software as me. here is a small community blog of law students. I thought this site had a simple, attractive gallery setup. (Japanese Apple store is very cool)

New Archives access

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-02-15 21:17

I fixed up the bar at right so that you can see posts listed by their categories, as well as the "master archive" page. A lot more could be done to make the individual archives more well-organized. That's in progress.

You can see all the posts dropped into categories. To clarify how all this stuff works, when I make a post entry, I choose the category I'd like it in. A crucial advantage of this software--compared with the old system--is that I can place a single post under multiple categories, like Minnesota and Music or Neo-Cons and Iraq.

Last year's HongPong.com archives reinstated

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-02-08 20:15

The good news is that last night I finally set some time aside to extract all the postings from the old HongPong.com and drop them into this new system, MovableType.

For those interested in the technicalities of it, I had the whole Scoop database as a giant XML file, with all the headlines, dates and encoded HTML. I needed to figure out how to use a technology called XLST to convert the XML into HTML, and from there copy it into MovableType. That took a while, but it worked. I also added some plug-ins, including the much-needed photo album plugins.

The old junker computer still isn't working and I think I'll have to ditch it.

Experiments in Ethernet technology

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-02-01 17:47

I got a cheap CompUSA PCI Ethernet card for the potential server. Unfortunately, there is some kind of hellish problem which prevents the card from getting an IRQ number correctly. This is not my area of expertise and it is God damned annoying. I've got 14 days to get it working, before the card would have to be returned. It seems to be an issue with BIOS settings, a problem particularly since the BIOS is 8 years old. I may have to get a BIOS upgrade or something. Perhaps what I need is a PC guru...

Internet fritzing again

Submitted by HongPong on Sun, 2004-02-01 17:15

It seems that Comcast Internet access throughout the neighborhood has been made quite flaky by the snowstorms last night. Andy over at Shadow Falls tells us that theirs is messed up too. (still flurries coming down) The Internet keeps coming up and down. Damn, this is annoying!!!!

Too junky to work

Submitted by HongPong on Wed, 2004-01-28 05:16

I am sad to say that this old computer is not going to work, because it has some kind of horrible technology called an "ISA plug-n-play network card" Linux has a hell of a time using the device. It is theoretically possible to get these things going but it would be pretty ugly, and the very old BIOS also seems bad. This is the problem with PCs, the commodity parts aren't good. Granted, this junker was very old and messed up to begin, but I like to recycle such things if I get ahold of them. Maybe a PCI Ethernet card could fit in it. Those are cheap.

Also the weird IBM monitor quietly makes

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