Tread lightly on the things of earth : Wed, Oct 2, 2002

Wednesday, October 2, 2002

The Mac is computing's new common ground. What do you know? Derrick Story at O'Reilly says

After just one day at the Mac OS X Conference in Santa Clara, I can tell you that Mac OS X seems to be the new common ground for computing . . .
It's becoming clear to me that if it can be done, it can be done on a Mac.

But of course.
3:57:41 PM | See also macosx

Apple stands firm against entertainment cartel. Sometimes when Apple does something annoying/restrictive/dumb--IOW, that offends my malleable free software ethic--I weigh again whether the delights of Mac OS X are worth it to me. Maybe, I think, I ought to fall back to running utterly free OSs like Debian GNU/Linux or NetBSD on my main machine, as these make me quite happy, too.

Then I'm reminded in articles like Dan Gillmor's yesterday, Apple stands firm against entertainment cartel, that Apple's "trajectory of behavior" continues in a direction I can support:

Mac OS X, Apple's modern operating system, is becoming, whether by design or by accident, a Digital Rights Management operating system where the rights in question are the user's rights -- and they are expansive.

2:40:04 PM | See also macosx

Test of referrer system. Here's a gratuitous link to my MT weblog to see if Stephen Downes' referrer system is working there.
1:26:34 PM |

KMpings, a collection of Knowledge Management TrackBack pings. I've been following David Gammel's "collection of Knowledge Management TrackBack pings" at KMpings for a while, and I've learned more about KM than I've ever known before. Good stuff.
12:30:07 PM |

Dakota the bouvier is packin' her bags and movin' south.

Since Paddington the bouvier had to leave us last month, we've been searching for another bouvier to welcome into our family. We decided to adopt an adult rescue dog, as there are plenty that need homes, and we've already had a wonderful experience a few years ago rescuing a dear old bouvier girl named Tess.

Looks like Dakota is coming to live with us! Her first three years must have been deplorable, and it shows. Once she arrives and gets hugged, attended, and spruced up, I'll put a happy "after" picture of her alongside this "before" one.

Our experience so far with the heroic folks at Second Chance Bouvier Rescue has been delightful.

UPDATE 2002-10-10: We met with Dakota yesterday and were forced to decide that her forcible personality and history of abuse calls for a firmer hand than we've got to offer right now. My hunch is she's going to turn out great for someone. Bless you, little one.
12:04:40 PM | See also bouvier

Mac OS X for UNIX folk. This UNIX/BSD focus at Apple makes me extraordinarily happy:

According to Jordan Hubbard, Apple's manager of BSD technologies, Apple is working hard to make Mac OS X as seamless a change as possible to the many UNIX users out there. Most importantly, Apple wants this strong core of programmers to be able to bring their applications from the college mainframe home to the Mac and back without any hassle.
"Since most of the Mac OS diehards now acknowledge at least the inevitability of Mac OS X," Hubbard said, "Apple is focusing on what to do to bring UNIX users to the Macintosh."

Ever since I got the UNIX religion several years ago, I find using Windows (any version) is like slipping into something . . . uncomfortable, like a straitjacket.
10:43:57 AM | See also unix macosx