For the last couple of years I've been listening a lot of podcasts, and some of them I still listen to as soon as they have a new episode. Once you get up to a few hours of newly produced podcasts per week you have to find every possible time you can to listen to them. The time it takes to walk, bike or commute somewhere is great. I usually put my headphones on as soon as I go out alone, or if working on my own on something mundane like laundry or dishes. Listening while working is pointless since I either stop writing code, or stop listening. The podcasts listed below all demand full focus from the listener if you are to learn anything from them.
Digital Planet
Digital Planet from BBC is an easy going technology podcast that will discuss the latest general news in the IT area. Usually quite short and not very technical, but a good news update anyway.
In Our Time With Melvyn Bragg
This is another high quality BBC podcast, but it is quite "high brow" compared to Digital Planet and very broad in it's content. The episodes usually consist of a small group of British professors, together with the fast speaking host Melwyn Bragg, talking for an hour about anything from quantum mechanics to philosophy, or some major historic event. Very educating, but not a podcast to listen to when you are tired.
Linux Outlaws
Linux Outlaws is produced by Dan and Fab and is a humorous show about all kinds of Linux related news. It's lighthearted and I usually laugh out loud several times per episode. It is a fun way to keep updated on new releases (System Rescue CD?) and other Linux community information. The typical discussions usually include something like this:
Fab - "It's crap! I'll cut their balls off!"
Dan - "Yeah, let's keep an eye on that! Hmm, ok, lets move on then shall we."
LinuxLink Radio
LinuxLink Radio is a podcast about embedded Linux development produced by TimeSys. It is a highly technical show and usually each episode goes through a solution to a specific problem that you might run into when working with embedded Linux devices. Very informative and a news update on the embedded world.
SALT - Seminars About Long Term Thinking
The Long Now Foundation invite some great speakers and they always have very interesting speakers. The podcasts are usually over an hour and usually start with Stuart Brand introducing the speaker and topic of the evening. Unfortunately some presentations are a bit too image focused and because of that hard to follow as a podcast. At the end of each presentation Kevin Kelly asks the questions collected from the audience during the presentation. The shows are not that many, and they are all worth listening to. They will make you think about time with a different perspective.
Science Talk - The Podcast of Scientific American
This podcast is closely connected to the Scientific American magazine and usually discuss the articles comming in the next paper issue with the author of each article. My favorite part every week is the bogus news quiz where they list four strange news stories and you have to guess which one is false.
Software Engineering Radio - The podcast for professional software developers
If deep and highly technical podcasts about software development suits your taste, this is your podcast. Sometimes it might feel a bit too abstract or a very narrow topic, but you will defenitely learn a lot. There's quite a big archive over at the SE-radio site.
The Java Posse
Java Posse is one of the longest running podcasts I listen to and currently they're at episode number 276! Tor Norbye, Carl Quinn, Dick Wall and Joe Nuxol do the talking and the episodes vary from recordings of discussion panels and interviews, to theme episodes and pure news updates. The tone is cheerful and full of jokes and not always on topic, but that's a good thing.
This American Life
If you like long detailed stories, this is the podcast for you. The show consists of one or more interviews per episode about a certain type of life changing event. A high quality production.
Three Moves Ahead
This is a strategy gaming podcast from Flash of steel where Troy Goodfellow, Tom Chick, Bruce Geryk and Julian Murdoch discuss boardgames and computer strategy games. There's a lot of "in-jokes" and references to old games and the tone is very casual. Even if I'm not much of a gamer any more, it's still interesting to stay up to date on what is happening in that area.
WNYC's Radio Lab
This extremely well produced podcast from WNYC is hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich. They talk about a wide variety of scientific subjects and use a lot of sound effects and music. It is a podcast suitable to everyone since the language used is very clear and the topics are all interesting.
Word of Mouth
This is the podcast version of the long running Word of Mouth radio show from NHPR. It feels more like a normal radio show than a typical podcast and have a good mix of quick news and deep interviews.
I gladly recommend all the podcasts mentioned above and they are worth every minute it takes to listen to them.
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label history. Show all posts
2009-08-28
2008-04-17
History in Zsh
Since I use Zsh with shared history, the normal history command doesn't work properly. Instead I came up with this ugly hack using cat and cut:
cm@tyst> cat ~/.zshhistory | cut -c16-40 |awk '{a[$1]++ } END{for(i in a){print a[i] " " i}}'|sort -rn|headand for root:
550 ls
496 cd
322 make
224 vim
168 su
151 screen
105 ssh
91 bitbake
76 rm
58 mtn
root@tyst> cat ~/.zshhistory | cut -c16-40 |awk '{a[$1]++ } END{for(i in a){print a[i] " " i}}'|sort -rn|headGuess it's quite obvious what distro I use on my computer at home and what I spend time doing...
713 emerge
312 vim
247 ls
165 cd
120 screen
108 iptables
83 etc-update
60 top
59 dmesg
53 cp
2007-07-02
Zeitgeist - Realize the truth
Who doesn't love a good conspiracy theory? This Zeitgeist movie, cut into three separate videos are all highly interesting and thought provoking. A comprehensive list of source material can be found here and the public statement he's trying to make is here.
The Greatest Story Ever Told (26:20 minutes)
The program shows Jesus as being the same old Sun God that people have worshiped for ages. That the stories in the Bible are incredibly similar to the stories of other older religions. Of course people borrow ideas and stories from things they've heard or read before, but the similarities shown are astounding. I'd say it's a very valid analysis of religion and how to make one.
All The World's A Stage (33:24 minutes)
This movie is scary and highly provocative. Basically it says that 9/11 was performed by the US government to increase it's own power. It shows exactly how many coincidences that had to happen at the precise time for this "terrorist attack" to be as devastating as it was. T
Don't mind the men behind the curtain (47:05 minutes)
I've read articles concerning this before, but the presentation here is exceptional and worth a careful view. It shows just how much power the international bankers have and how that the economy of a country is so totally in control of the Central bank. The Central bank controls the interest rates and the inflation, constantly loaning money to the government with an interest. The bank also regulates the value of the currency by increasing or decreasing the amount of money being printed. The focus is on the American Federal Reserve and it's tight ties to the major banking families in the US. The Wall street crash of 1929 is described as biggest robbery of all time. I'm highly surprised that The Fed is privately owned and that they wanted USA to join the WW I, the WW II and the Vietnam war to earn even more money. And with a pointer to the second video, the American governments War on Terrorism is the same thing all over again. According to the movie it's all a huge money scam.
The last 20 minutes describes an intricate plan to come to a point in the future where we have a "One world government". It's somewhat of a doomsday scenario, and a scary one indeed. A good background to have in regard to the power of media is to watch Outfoxed. Who are all these "men behind the curtain"?
As the statement said, the whole purpose of these videos is to act as an eye opener for people to look more critically at the world around us. I've always thought I've tried to look at the world from all angles but these films really act as a cold shower wake up. I guess the end comment in the statement sums it up perfectly:
(Updated links to the correct Google Video)
The Greatest Story Ever Told (26:20 minutes)
The program shows Jesus as being the same old Sun God that people have worshiped for ages. That the stories in the Bible are incredibly similar to the stories of other older religions. Of course people borrow ideas and stories from things they've heard or read before, but the similarities shown are astounding. I'd say it's a very valid analysis of religion and how to make one.
All The World's A Stage (33:24 minutes)
This movie is scary and highly provocative. Basically it says that 9/11 was performed by the US government to increase it's own power. It shows exactly how many coincidences that had to happen at the precise time for this "terrorist attack" to be as devastating as it was. T
Don't mind the men behind the curtain (47:05 minutes)
I've read articles concerning this before, but the presentation here is exceptional and worth a careful view. It shows just how much power the international bankers have and how that the economy of a country is so totally in control of the Central bank. The Central bank controls the interest rates and the inflation, constantly loaning money to the government with an interest. The bank also regulates the value of the currency by increasing or decreasing the amount of money being printed. The focus is on the American Federal Reserve and it's tight ties to the major banking families in the US. The Wall street crash of 1929 is described as biggest robbery of all time. I'm highly surprised that The Fed is privately owned and that they wanted USA to join the WW I, the WW II and the Vietnam war to earn even more money. And with a pointer to the second video, the American governments War on Terrorism is the same thing all over again. According to the movie it's all a huge money scam.
The last 20 minutes describes an intricate plan to come to a point in the future where we have a "One world government". It's somewhat of a doomsday scenario, and a scary one indeed. A good background to have in regard to the power of media is to watch Outfoxed. Who are all these "men behind the curtain"?
As the statement said, the whole purpose of these videos is to act as an eye opener for people to look more critically at the world around us. I've always thought I've tried to look at the world from all angles but these films really act as a cold shower wake up. I guess the end comment in the statement sums it up perfectly:
"It is my hope that people will not take what is said in the film as the truth, but find out for themselves, for truth is not told, it is realized."Time for all of us to realize.
(Updated links to the correct Google Video)
2007-06-26
The Seashell on the Mountaintop
I just finished reading The Seashell on the Mountaintop, the Swedish version. Picked it up as a cheap pocket book and I was pleasantly surprised. The book was a fascinating read and showed many of the troubles scientists faced during 17th century, both political and religious.
The story involves Nicholas Steno, born in Denmark as Niels Stensen and starts when he has just finished his anatomy studies. Being exceptionally skilled with the scalpel, Steno is the first to discover the saliva glands and the tear canal and his public dissections are quickly becoming famous events. He travels all over Europe, through Amsterdam, Paris, Florence and Hannover, spending most of his time working at the then famous Accademia del Cimento in Florence. The academy was funded by the brothers Ferdinando II and Leopoldo de Medici and was the first one focusing solely on "experimental philosophy".
After years of thinking about the problem of seashells being found inside rocks and mountains everywhere Steno figured out the final piece in the puzzle. By carefully studying layers of rocks in hills of Tuscany he realized that sediments in water were deposited at the bottom with the largest particles first and then smaller and smaller particles on top. Steno concluded that the layers and strata in the cliffs and mountains had been deposited in the same way with the newest layers in the direction of the smaller particles above the bigger ones. He also suggested that the seashells inside were real seashells from the sea, not growing inside the rock. He realized the significance of being able to tell the age of the layers of rock apart and opened the way to study the ancient history of Earth.
In 1669 he published his findings in a short booklet called De solido intra solidum naturaliter contento dissertationis prodromus, that translated means Preliminary discourse to a dissertation on a solid body naturally contained within a solid. This was the first published study of geology performed in a completely scientific way that included the previously ignored time dimension that's so clearly embedded in the rock layers.
The rest of the book describes how Steno continues his studies of sediments and mountains, but also his increasing devotion to Catholicism eventually earning him the title of bishop. The book is well written and I could not put it down until I finished reading the last page.
Something that surprises me with the book is the amount of famous scientists and philosophers that Steno meets. He becomes friends or colleagues with such celebrities as Baruch Spinoza, Giovanni Borelli, the contemporary members of The Royal Society of London, Gottfried Leibniz and many more. Opinions and observations concerning Stenos interests in anatomy and geology made by thinkers like Descartes, Da Vinci and even earlier Aristotle is also included in the book.
Even if the world feels a lot smaller now with easy communication and quick traveling across the globe, it's still inspiring to see how people have always liked to travel and exchange ideas. The Seashell on the Mountaintop made history feel more vibrant to me than it has in a long time.
The story involves Nicholas Steno, born in Denmark as Niels Stensen and starts when he has just finished his anatomy studies. Being exceptionally skilled with the scalpel, Steno is the first to discover the saliva glands and the tear canal and his public dissections are quickly becoming famous events. He travels all over Europe, through Amsterdam, Paris, Florence and Hannover, spending most of his time working at the then famous Accademia del Cimento in Florence. The academy was funded by the brothers Ferdinando II and Leopoldo de Medici and was the first one focusing solely on "experimental philosophy".
After years of thinking about the problem of seashells being found inside rocks and mountains everywhere Steno figured out the final piece in the puzzle. By carefully studying layers of rocks in hills of Tuscany he realized that sediments in water were deposited at the bottom with the largest particles first and then smaller and smaller particles on top. Steno concluded that the layers and strata in the cliffs and mountains had been deposited in the same way with the newest layers in the direction of the smaller particles above the bigger ones. He also suggested that the seashells inside were real seashells from the sea, not growing inside the rock. He realized the significance of being able to tell the age of the layers of rock apart and opened the way to study the ancient history of Earth.
In 1669 he published his findings in a short booklet called De solido intra solidum naturaliter contento dissertationis prodromus, that translated means Preliminary discourse to a dissertation on a solid body naturally contained within a solid. This was the first published study of geology performed in a completely scientific way that included the previously ignored time dimension that's so clearly embedded in the rock layers.
The rest of the book describes how Steno continues his studies of sediments and mountains, but also his increasing devotion to Catholicism eventually earning him the title of bishop. The book is well written and I could not put it down until I finished reading the last page.
Something that surprises me with the book is the amount of famous scientists and philosophers that Steno meets. He becomes friends or colleagues with such celebrities as Baruch Spinoza, Giovanni Borelli, the contemporary members of The Royal Society of London, Gottfried Leibniz and many more. Opinions and observations concerning Stenos interests in anatomy and geology made by thinkers like Descartes, Da Vinci and even earlier Aristotle is also included in the book.
Even if the world feels a lot smaller now with easy communication and quick traveling across the globe, it's still inspiring to see how people have always liked to travel and exchange ideas. The Seashell on the Mountaintop made history feel more vibrant to me than it has in a long time.
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