Man, screw KDE4

So I finally broke down and upgraded my laptop to Kubuntu Intrepid. Everything went great -- until I restarted, and found that my nice, neat, KDE 3.5.1 desktop had been replaced by ugly-ass KDE4. Not only did it make no attempt to import my keyboard shortcuts from KDE3, I discovered that changing the keyboard shortcuts requires you to log out and log back in. The default window decorations are ugly as sin, and even worse, the GTK integration makes all GTK apps ugly.

For all you KDE users, I recommend staying with KDE 3 as long as you can. I just switched to XFCE, and I'm never looking back.

Dreaming of Androids

Today I received my new HTC Dream, a.k.a. the T-Mobile G1, running Google's Android OS, and it kicks the iPhone's sorry ass.



How is it better, you ask?

1. It has more than one farking button. In fact, it has a full QWERTY keyboard.
2. It took only four taps to enable installation of "unofficial" applications. No jailbreaking needed.
3. It can run more than one goddamn app at a time.
4. I don't need to pay 99 bucks to distribute an app.
5. I don't need to send it in just to change the battery.
6. If I lose the data cable, I have a crapton of USB mini-B cables lying around that will work just as well.

And what does the iPhone have that the G1 doesn't?

1. Multitouch. Ooh, look, I can squeeze the page and it gets smaller. Big whoop.
2. A half-eaten piece of fruit stenciled on the back.
3. An aura of smugness.

iPhone fanboys, flame away.

Dammit, Google, quit changing your icon!

The purpose of a website's icon — or any icon, for that matter — is to provide a visual way to quickly find something in a list. Sometimes, the icon represents some abstract concept; in most applications, the "save" icon is a floppy disk, even though they're nearly obsolete. However, if the icon is unique, experienced users have no trouble connecting it with what it represents. I use icons exclusively for my bookmarks toolbar:




Of course, this only works when the icons don't change. Google has recently changed their icon again, just as I was getting used to the second one. Call me old-fashioned, but I happen to like the original Google icon.

I can understand changing the logo on the front page for special holidays (which seems like just about every day now), but icons shouldn't be changed just for the hell of it.

My crappy little server gets an upgrade; perverts game back online; politics

My primary server, "marvin", just got an upgrade from this:

To this:

	Old	New
OS	Heavily modified RedHat 8.0	Xubuntu 8.10 "Intrepid Ibex"
Processor	AMD Athlon XP 2500+ 1.8Ghz	Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 2.4Ghz
Memory	1GB DDR 333Mhz(2x512MB)	2GB DDR2 800Mhz (soon to be 8GB)
Motherboard	PCChips "piece of shit" M848A	GigaByte GA-EP45C-DS3R
Video	NVidia GeForce FX 5700 Ultra	NVidia, um, *cough*geforce 2*cough*

Ok, so the video isn't that great. It is primarily a server, after all. The FX 5700 ultra is AGP, so I had to rummage around in the scrap bin to find a PCI video card. The next phase of updates will include a PCIe video card and 6GB more memory.

Anyway, since I now have plenty of CPU cycles to spare, I've decided to bring back the "Pick the Perverts" game. Can you tell a pervert just by looking at him?

Also, since this is probably the last blog in the world that hasn't mentioned Obama, here goes: Thank the FSM! He'll have a tough job restoring the economy, but he certainly can't do worse than Dubya.
This is truly history; Obama has broken out of the mold set by the last 43 presidents. Maybe in my lifetime, we could even have an openly gay or Atheist president. One can only hope...

New web server

Wow, it's been almost two years since my last blog post. Not that anyone reads it. I guess that means you don't exist...

Anyway, I've just finished migrating my website to Lighttpd. It was a pain in the ass, but I should get a little more performance out of it.

So, if you see something broken, let me know.

So, saying "fuck" makes me a molester

I just got the following e-mail:

From: Christian ******* <jeremiah.*******@yahoo.com>
To: jspenguin@gmail.com
Subject: site

You are a very sick person.

Your site MOLESTS. You are a molester. The filth you spew out is particularly sickening to me, who was molested by various people from the age of 5-12.

I am NOT a molester, but a victim. Jesus helped me lose most of my anger and all of my bitterness. He has been my only true friend.

Your site sickened me and made me regret going there. I feel violated by the content.

When victims are as gross and perverted as you are, the ONLY hope for them is the Lord.

I have suffered all my life from being made a victim of perverts, but I never became crude and filthy. I never insulted and sickened people. I never would create something that is perverted and sick...and then put it online where many people will be molested by it. If my little child went to your site, I would sue you and see that you went to prison. You are NO BETTER THAN YOUR STEP FATHER!

WAKE UP AND GET YOUR LIFE TOGETHER. BECOME CLEAN, NOT FILTHY.


In case you hadn't noticed, I tend to use strong language. The fact that my site is called "Jspenguin's shitty little web site" should be some clue. But apparently, that makes me a molester. Some little kid is going to be so traumatized by the word "fuck" that he's going to kill himself. Um, no.

Not everyone has an imaginary friend in the sky to talk to. When I get angry about something, I write about it. Go ahead and sue. Try to send me to prison.

All I can say is, thank the Flying Spaghetti Monster for the first amendment.

More perverts on the Internet

In a previous post, I lamented on the fact that there are a lot of people on the Internet using Google to try to find, well, certain images involving children and reproduction. And I don't mean videos of women giving birth.

Well, they just kept on coming. Here is an excerpt from my web server log. As I said before, do they really expect to find what they're looking for?