life's little miracles - no I don't mean babies or a lil dog saving someone's life
Mood:  happy
Now Playing: the comforting hum of 6 hard drives
Topic: School Stuff
A lot of people believe that either a) Miracles are make-believe; a way for people to have hope in a world where it seems to be lacking or
b) Miracles used to happen back in the Biblical days, but there aren't any today

Then there's a small minority in category c. These people believe that miracles continue to go on. Some, like the baby found yesterday in Japan after being burried in earthquake rubble for a few days, are big. Others, like finding a dollar when you really need one, are a little bit smaller.

What a miracle really comes down to is a paradigm shift in one's thought process. Either you believe that all the ridiculously amazing things that happen in the world are by chance or you believe in miracles. Of course, sometimes people use synonyms for miracle so that they don't have to sound religious, but it's the same thing.

If there's one thing that Cornell Engineering has taught me, it's that there is a LOT of randomness in the world, however, there is no "chance".

Why am I railing on about miracles? (especially because I believe I've written about this before - at least in a different way) Because I feel that I experienced one that was both trivial and huge at the same time.

I was looking at my buddy list because someone's name caught my eye in the signon popup box. I didn't even get to talk to the person because they signed off immediately. However, on my way up my buddy list I noticed a friend of mine who's in my ridiculously impossible class. I talked to him by chance to see what he was up to and ended up learning that I had started to do a full half of my lab completely wrong! I had to use negative values for this part instead of positive values. I am SO glad that I talked to him because I would have hated working on this so hard and long and have half of it be wrong because of a sign error.

Instead of being mad that I had to do some parts, I was overjoyed at discovering this mistake while I could still do something about it. That is the fundamental difference that allows me to enjoy life and have more energy than others. (Not counting this week where I've been deprived of everything except love from my family and fiancee - and even there we have barely had time to have a passing hug - forget talking or spending time together.)

Well, I have to get back to finishing my impossible labs. Thanks for bearing with me.

PCMCIA Ethernet/Wireless Cards and Linux
Mood:  don't ask
Now Playing: "Oops! The Real Slim Shady Did It Again" - Eminem vs Britney Spears
Topic: Linux
When I graduate I intend to have a webpage devoted to giving advice on deploying linux. One real disadvantage of the OS is that each person has different hardware and software and there are also different Linux distros so it's almost impossible to find help that consistantly works. Let me provide the following for now, based on a few weeks of frustration.

If you want to put it on a laptop and have wireless 802.11 or ethernet access I tried three brands and had the best success for the least amount of work on Netgear brand. Specifically, get WG511 (it says it on the outside of the package) for wirelss. After just a quick customization to update the firmware, it works. It only took me 10 minutes to do. The ethernet card just worked. For the first time you boot up you may have to have both cards out for everything to work right. After that you can always leave the ethernet card in and just ignore any complaints it gives at boot time. For the wireless I have found it best, in my experience, to leave it out until you get all the way to the desktop. Then insert it and go from there.

Happy surfing - keep the world free by using opensource whenever you can. I know it's tough, I still have to keep around my M$ Windows system for school and some other high-powered apps that haven't yet been ported to Linux.

Ok, I have a ~10^7 things to do by the end of this week so I'm out.

you have to see this
A funny flash political cartoon

I can't wait until I have time to make real posts again...

lack of updates - why?
Mood:  don't ask
Topic: Site Info
You may be wondering why the last of posts; even lack of dead eric days. Well, I've been all over the place for job interviews. That's the first problem. The second problem is that these interviews have caused me to fall a little behind. I'm not behind by a lot, but the problem is that this week is when everything is due so being behind by any amount isn't good. Two more days until hell is over.

See you on the other side...

Wegman's - Where Shopping for Drugs is a Pleasure
Mood:  chatty
Topic: random

Yesterday Danielle was reviewing her receipt from that afternoon's grocery shopping. After staring at it for a few minutes she came up to to me, "What's Premium Pot?" I was perplexed at her question especially juxtaposed with the fact that she was handing me the receipt. Premium Pot? WTF is that? What was purchased that could be called a pot? I started to think that maybe it was some kind of prank that they pull on people since there are a lot of hippies around here.

"What were the groceries?" We kept asking while both cracking up at the crude joke that belonged in a Cheech and Chong Movie, while at the same time getting a little peeved over not being able to figure it out. "Ok, list it!" I said.

"Carrots, chicken, ground beef, and celery." she answered.

"Chicked pot pie maybe?" We hadn't bought any potted plants...what was going on here?

Finally, out of the corner of her eye Danielle spots a bag of potatoes. "OH!" she exclaims, "Premium Potatoes!" We had a bit more of a laught and it was over.

Personally, I think that they should think of a better receipt abbreviation for potatoes than pot. That's just a little unnerving.

edit: I just noticed they spelled spaghetti wrong. Wow....
also...I reduced the receipt size, because a whole page is a little drastic.

dead eric day #4
Mood:  a-ok
Now Playing: Love Hina Opening Song
Topic: dead eric day

I wouldn't mind being on this train for two reasons:
1) I wouldn't be in Cornell
2) I would be headed to see my future in-laws, whom I love

Linux Kicks @$$
Mood:  chatty
Now Playing: "Andrea" - MxPx
Topic: computers
So, want to throw off the oppressive yoke that Bill Gates has on you? "yeah!" you say enthusiastically, "but I don't want a Mac. No one makes programs for them and they are VERY expensive." No problem! Linux is cheap; free, in fact! Well, the computer isn't free, but it CAN be cheap. Let me explain...

As you have learned in either a HS or College level economics class, it's bad for a company to have a monopoly. Why? Because they don't have competition therefore they get lazy and stop trying to hard. Internet Explorer, for example, hasn't has too many major updates since Netscape bit the dust. Well, since Windows has pretty much been unchallenged for 14+ years, they feel that they can do whatever they want. This includes having a bloated OS and programs that hog all of your memory. I have 512 Mb of RAM and Windows complains if I have too many Office applications open.

Enter Linux:

This humble OS was born from the mind of Linus Torvalds. His basic mission evolved into desgining an operating system that was completely free. This doesn't just mean free in the monetary sense. He wanted the license to be as open as possible so that you could install it on as many computers as you wanted. Did you know, for example, that it's illegal for you to put MS Office on more than one computer with one disc unless it's a multi-license disc? Not so with Linux! You can install it on the computer of everyone who lives on your block and you can't get in trouble with the law.

Because Linux isn't as bloated as Windows, it can typically run on an older machine. You can go all the way to a 386 with 64 Mb of RAM if you want. If you want to have an AWESOME computer, get 4 GHz 1 GB RAM and put Linux on it. You'll be amazed at how cleanly and quickly it runs.

Now, Linux comes in different flavors, called distrobutions. They are known by those who are really into Linux as "distros". Some examples are Debian, SuseLinux, Fedora, and SELinux. Each has different good things and bad things. Some are better for sound and others for servers. Since they are free you can try them all until you find the right one for you.

The best thing about Linux is that most distrobutions come with free license programs that do everything that Windows programs do. For example, there is OpenOffice that does the same thing as MS Office. There is a spreadsheet, a word processor, a powerpoint-clone, and an email/calendar program. There are other numerous examples - basically, anything that Windows can do, MS can do better. Certain things are built into the operating system, such as CD burning (which was only added to Win with XP)and you can do cool stuff such as tell a file to burn to CD as soon as it downloads off the net.

Finally, you have the advantage and cool power of running programs from the command line. It's one of those things that you have to try to know what I'm talking about.

But, there ARE some disadvantages. First of all, not all hardware works with Linux. They are trying their hardest to make hardware work with it, but Windows has an advantage. You see the hardware manufacturers tell Microsoft how to make Windows work with their software. The other disadvantage is that it's hard to get help if you need it because most people aren't using Linux yet. But you can find a lot of info on < href=www.google.com/linux>www.google.com/linux or in IRC chatrooms.

So you want to try out this awesome OS? Not so fast! You see, unless you have two hard drives (in which case you could have one OS on each drive and pick the one u want when u boot up) you can only really have one OS. So having Linux means erasing Windows. Now you're like...well...what if I don't like Linux? Well, it's ok because there's a version of Linux just for you. It's called Knoppix. Knoppix is a version of Linux that completely runs off of the CD instead of installing it. This allows you to try out Linux without the commitment of losing Windows. The only thing is that you can only save to floppy or USB. Then if you like it you can tell Bill Gates where to stick Windows. You can get Knoppix here -> www.knoppix.net

PS - Linux tends to be very friendly on being used in different languages - much better than Windows

Think twice before posting those pictures!
Mood:  chatty
Topic: The Web
I've posted pictures of myself before, and I never thought of this. So, in the future beware of posting a picture of yourself online or THIS could happen!

Affirmative Action
Mood:  chatty
Topic: News
Here at Eric's Binary World we believe in equal opportuinity for all, therefore, here is a wonderfully funny page making fun of Kerry's "tendency" to flip-flop.

http://johnkerryads.websiteanimal.com/

Quotes!!!!
Mood:  chatty
Now Playing: "I Be" - GRITS
Topic: Quotes
Once again I empty my profile quotes into the blog so that I can put more quotes on my profile.

"Never forget the ABCD Law. It's bigger than Maxwell" (gasps from students) - Prof Pollock

"ABCD Law is like religous law - accept it with blind faith." - Prof Pollock

"Women should be obscene and not heard." - John Lennon

"It was the big MS marketing juggernaut and money spent up the ying-yang...We were thinking 'Geez, how are we going to compete with this?' Fortunately, the products sucked beyond our wildest dreams" - Ed Colligan at Palm 1996

"I want a bag of rice, 1lb of meat, some rice, and 28 boxes of Viagra" - lyrics to Viagra by Oro Solido (Merengue band)