End of year blog summary

I always mean to analyse what I blog about over the year, but never get round to it.

Well I finally have by downloading a single page html for the year of 2011.

Using some perl to extract the categories into the form Label->Frequency

Finally a short gnuplot script to do a histogram (this is very simple and I'm sure could be improved):

set style data histograms
set style fill solid 1.0 border -1
set xtics rotate
set term png
set output "barchart.png"
plot 'cats.txt' using 2:xticlabels(1) title 'categories'

Giving a png file that is here to given the categories.

Book read: All Hell Let Loose by Max Hastings

Hastings has written many historical accounts of war, mainly books focusing on an operation of a certain aspect of a war.

This books takes on the ambitious task of describing all of the 1939-1945 era. It does so from a top down analysis of events and their relative context to the wider war, and also from individuals accounts to convey the events themselves.

It is a great combination, the book is long but well edited - each chapter is concentrated on a single campaign or war aspect.

Hastings is particularly dispassionate about the British contribution, praise where it is due but also bringing up the failures (mainly in the far east). He also leaves no doubt as to where the most brutal fighting was on the eastern front, and the fact the allies had lighter fighting, this perhaps more reflects the brutality of the eastern front than anything else.

The eyewitness accounts are well inserted, and sometimes harrowing and saddening to read - but form an important part of the story away from reeling off cold figures about the war.

Managing Decline

Some papers from the Thatcher government call for the "managed decline" of Liverpool in the 1980s after the Toxteth riots. This is depressing reading, good that it never came to that - but it does show that it was being considered, in an effort of where best to focus resources.

Funny that Heseltine (clearly unloved even then), was sent as "minister for Merseyside" to help paper over things. Looking back the picture may have been depressing but Liverpool has been regenerated in parts - but it does serve as a warning as we are probably in a similar situation with a government which has over extended to cover undeserving banks leaving little for regional development (something which would serve many more people).

Retro Gaming

It is always impressive to see the emulators out there for long dead hardware to run code written for them. Chiefly in the games arena, things you might have played as a kid and want to relive, if only briefly.

It seems that most producers are happy for this to go on, they games can no longer be bought - and no business is being lost be someone else offering them for free.

Unfortunately the games of Ultimate are an exception, which is a pity because they were the most innovative and ground breaking on the 8 bit computing scene. Maybe there are good reasons why the games themselves are still being protected by their owner. In the interests of keeping our computing history alive, I'd like to see an agreement that makes all such software for long dead platforms freed up.

Dyson advert

The one case I can think of where patent law protected an innovative inventor who was being copied by larger rivals is Dyson.

They currently have an advert campaign showing an exploded view Dyson with parts that could be copied (hardly any) without infringing patents.

But now of course, Dyson is the big company having being extremely successful. At what point do they become the incumbent over protecting their IP investment and stopping a more nimbler business from prospering?

Betfair Betting Problem

A few red faces at Betfair, a runner stays matched at 28-1 even after crossing the line...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/horseracing/8981353/Betfair-faces-backlash-after-in-running-fiasco-over-Leopardstown-Christmas-Hurdle.html

Apparently £21m matched leading to an exposure of around £600m.

Clearly a systems fault - as Betfair are suggesting, any punter with that much on their account would be highly unlikely (unless George Osborne is getting desperate!).

So they are not going to honour the bets, to do so would probably banrupt them! - but still very bad publicity and the last thing they need.

UK Tax System

Good summary of the UK tax system, the article demonstrating that income is taxed far more heavily than other forms of earnings.

http://www.lovemoney.com/news/household-bills/tax/12685/why-working-is-a-mugs-game

So about 30% of income for most people. A simplified tax system is long overdue, but it seems further away than ever. Especially since direct income tax is seen as a difficult thing for the government to raise.

Film: Christmas Vacation directed by Jeremiah Chechik

This is a film I try to watch every year prior to Christmas. It is a Chevy Chase comedy vehicle about a father and mother trying to ensure the perfect Christmas for their unappreciative children and relatives.

There are many over the top scenes to tell the viewer that sometimes more is less. The Griswold family Christmas tree is cut down from the forest, far to big to be practical. Chase spends days nailing lights to the house, which fail to light up on the grand opening - when they do they cause a neighbourhood power surge.

Griswold's trailer trash brother turns up who is on hard times, and needs to sponge Christmas off his brother. He tries to repay him by bringing his boss to the house to explain why there was no Christmas bonus this year.

The neighbours are a typical 80s modern couple who are shunning Christmas, but inevitably suffer from Griswold's attempt to celebrate it, this leads to some good comedy routines for Chase.

One funny thing that is obviously taken from the Wonderful Life film is the bannister on the stair annoying Chase (as it does Stewart), Chase "fixing" it with a chainsaw.

So a little dated, still funny, and does make you think of Christmas excess and how it is best avoided. 7/10

Raspberry Pi Close

A link to a blog update stating that the initial run of boards is being tested, if they are ok then a bigger production run will begin.

http://www.raspberrypi.org/archives/422

That is really good news, and it looks an interesting projects device. It is interesting to look at the interfaces they have chosen on their minimal footprint device. I see the model B device as the only sensible option for a development board because of the network connection, the HDMI or RCA connector seems a little strange - but maybe RCA is more popular in the US. But given space was at a premium you think HDMI would be their only connector covering both audio and video. I had also read they wanted a device to connect simple to a range of output devices, so perhaps that is the reason.

Performance of the board would be of most interest to me, I have an Intel Atom based Nettop for any video viewing and archiving of content. It is certainly adequate at that but it does not take much to reach the limits of the device when doing CPU intensive work. You certainly notice yet another Windows Update getting downloaded if you were watching a video at the same time.

This board has a 700Mhz processor and 256Mbyte RAM, but the demos do show some pretty impressive results even though it does feel light on memory.

Microsoft step down from CES

Reported this week is the 2012 CES will be Microsofts last fronting of the event.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/12/22/microsoft_dump_ces/

I've followed the keynote for a few years, actually sitting down watching it making notes - interested to see what Microsoft are trying to push out there. So although it is not a total surprise that they are pulling out it does mean I won't get that information about what they are doing. Of course a lot what they show never comes to pass, in that strange Microsoft way of never advertising something in simple terms but instead pitching between those "in the know" with over abstract marketing. Probably a symptom of a company that has been for so long a necessary evil bolt on, rather than someone you'd want to buy something from.

Film: It's a Wonderful Life Directed by Frank Capra

A post war film about a small town called Bedford in which James Stewart's character Bailey runs a small home loans business. He is portrayed as a selfless man who has passed up better opportunities to stay running the family business. The town also has a hard nosed banker who would want to see the business run on less benevolent terms.

The business hits hard times, there is a run on the loan company (where Stewart gets to explain fractional reserve lending rather well). Potter makes Bailey an offer for a much better paid job, which would be useful now that he is married and has family commitments. He turns it down on point of principle. This makes Potter want to see Bailey fail and he has his chance when he intercepts some deposit money from the loans company, enough to make them bankrupt.

With the investigators called in Bailey contemplates ending it all. At this point his guardian angel is sent down (who has been incentivised with the promise of earning his wings if he can sort out Bailey and save him). The guardian angel takes Bailey shows him how the world would be had he not being born. Predictably the Bedford town is called Pottersville, and he now has a very hard grip on the small town. His wife would never have married and is running the local library, and various things that affected other lives would not have happened.

The whole story ends with Bailey being sent back to his real existence and with the local town rallying round and raising the money to replace the stolen cash. A bell is also sounded to indicate that the angel gained his wings on the back of convincing Bailey to carry on.

A classic film, Stewart does feel a little overplayed at times - for example it does take him an awful long time for him to realise that the angel is showing him life in Bedford had he not lived. I would rate 6/10, IMDB has this much higher but maybe that's a nostalgic thing.

Listening: Live in Cleavland 2011 Rush

I have not done one of these entries since 2009! Of course I've been listening to things since then, but maybe not in the car or entire albums.

This is the latest Rush live album and I have been listening to it recently. It has some good tracks on it, a high point being the Working Man rendition (with a Reggae intro). Lees voice is a bit of a weak point, it seems like it is a bit strained on this concert - but a minor point.

Ebook read: The Secret Life of Bletchley Park by Sinclair McKay

A very thorough history of the role the code breaking in Bletchley played during the war years, also a portrait of those involved from high up to the people doing day to day work.

I found this a really interesting read, the book describes well the code breaking mechanics without getting too bogged down in detail. It ties historical war events to the background code breaking. I had never appreciated that the location of Bismarck, the North Africa campaign, the Atlantic convoy war, and keeping Russia in with intelligence had all benefited from code decrypts.

Throughout the author is at pains to explain the secrecy involved, to the extent that some information could not always be used because it would betray the source. This secrecy continued way after the war, it was not until the 1970s when a book was released about the "Ultra secret" that the first signs appeared.

Non use of information has some controversy, the book argues that it was not responsible for allowing Coventry to be bombed without any evacuation, or for not informing the Americans of Pearl Harbour.

The accepted truth is that the code breakers shortened the war by two years, I think that under sells them, keeping supply lines open in the Atlantic, and keeping Russia in with intelligence must have been a huge tactical advantage.

The post war secrecy is interesting, Britain missed out on the birth of the computer having ironically used something akin to them in the code breaking. Alan Turing was treated shamefully and killed himself in the early 1950s. The silence of those who worked at Bletchley is quite staggering, with some sad stories of people not being able to bring themselves to tell their families what their role was after many years.

Part of this maybe down to the compartmentalisation of the decoding tasks, huts on the park which did specific jobs and everyone working in a culture where you might not have known what was going on in other departments. Bletchley did have a brush with the Cambridge spy ring as they recruited from bright academic circles, and that sideline is also interesting with the author suggessting the British government was happy to let some information be divulged to the Russians this way.