January 2013 - luv-talk

Re: [luv-talk] dns error
by Tony Langdon 17 Jan '13

17 Jan '13

At 01:06 PM 1/17/2013, Brian May wrote: >Hello, > >If I try to resolveÂ ><http://oss.trac.sara.nl>oss.trac.sara.nl from >work (aarnet), it works. If I try to resolve it >from home (internode) it doesn't work. Works here (I'm on Internode) $ dig oss.trac.sara.nl ; <<>> DiG 9.6-ESV-R4-P3 <<>> oss.trac.sara.nl ;; global options: +cmd ;; Got answer: ;; ->>HEADER<<- opcode: QUERY, status: NOERROR, id: 16066 ;; flags: qr rd ra; QUERY: 1, ANSWER: 2, AUTHORITY: 3, ADDITIONAL: 2 ;; QUESTION SECTION: ;oss.trac.sara.nl. IN A ;; ANSWER SECTION: oss.trac.sara.nl. 14400 IN CNAME xtrac.osd.sara.nl. xtrac.osd.sara.nl. 3600 IN A 145.100.12.233 ;; AUTHORITY SECTION: sara.nl. 7199 IN NS nsauth1.sara.nl. sara.nl. 7199 IN NS ns2.surfnet.nl. sara.nl. 7199 IN NS nsauth2.sara.nl. ;; ADDITIONAL SECTION: ns2.surfnet.nl. 208 IN A 192.87.36.2 ns2.surfnet.nl. 208 IN AAAA 2001:610:3:200a:192:87:36:2 ;; Query time: 1166 msec ;; SERVER: 10.69.181.1#53(10.69.181.1) ;; WHEN: Thu Jan 17 16:38:00 2013 ;; MSG SIZE rcvd: 188 73 de VK3JED / VK3IRL http://vkradio.com

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annual Lego Brickvention is on this Sat 19th & Sun 20th
by David E Payne 16 Jan '13

16 Jan '13

The annual Lego Brickvention is on this Saturday 19th & Sunday 20th at the Royal Exhibition Buildings in Carlton, Melbourne, Australia. Tickets are only available online from http://www.brickventures.org.au/ See also http://au.groups.yahoo.com/group/mugs-list/ http://news.lugnet.com/loc/au/ & (NOT WORKING AT THE TIME OF WRITING THIS) www.melbourne-lego.info (I read that the Melbourne City Adventures meet-up are planning to visit at 3:30pm Saturday). Dav(e/id/o/y)

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Re: [luv-talk] Fake Wikipedia entry on Bicholim Conflict finally deleted after five years
by Rick Moen 16 Jan '13

16 Jan '13

Quoting Russell Coker (russell(a)coker.com.au) [...] > One thing that's always annoying is when people make wild claims > offering no evidence at all and then criticise people who reference > Wikipedia. Classic confirmation bias. Obligatory Wikipedia link follows. ;-> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias I am still wary about openly editing Wikipedia because of several examples I've seen in the past of well-known open source figure X making Wikipedia edits that then not only were reverted by pseudonymous Wikipedia regulars but then resulted in scurrilous personal attacks carried out by those pseudonymous editors _within_ the pages of Wikipedia upon well-known open source figure X. (The worst case I'm aware of was the really rather vicious lashback against Eric Raymond.) FWIW, when someone created a Wikipedia page about me a few years ago, I marked the article with the Wikipedia:Proposed deletion template (the process for deletion that seemed least likely to raise a backlash of resistance), and put the following note on the Talk page: I am the subject of this article: Rick Moen, rick(a)linuxmafia.com, tel. +1 (1) 650-283-7902. Although not personally a Wikipedian, I'm a friendly observer and frequent user. I'm proposing article deletion through the "Wikipedia:Proposed deletion" process for uncontroversial candidates, for deletion after five days if nobody objects, on WP:N grounds. 1. The data cited in the article do not constitute encyclopaedic notability, as they do not show the "significant coverage in reliable sources" required by WP:N to establish general notability. Within the rather narrow publicity circle of Linux and open source, the article subject (yr. humble servant) has had coverage, but not the _significant_ coverage required. 2. The data cited are severely compromised by transgressing the "independent of the subject" clause of WP:N's general notability guideline, as substantively all of the works cited were not only "produced by those affiliated with the subject", but were written by the subject himself. 3. One of the major data cited is inaccurate in the direction of exaggeration: Yr. humble servant did not "contribute the Linux User Group HOWTO to the Linux Documentation Project", but rather merely assumed maintenance of that document when its actual creator, Kendall Clark, no longer could do so. -- Rick M. On the bright side, subsequent to 2008, it really _does_ seem as if Wikipedia has cracked down quite a bit on abuse of pages to attack living persons. It used to be a big risk, and maybe not so much any more.

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Re: [luv-talk] Fake Wikipedia entry on Bicholim Conflict
by Tim Josling 15 Jan '13

15 Jan '13

Andrew, You said you didn't want to debate global warming, but you then immediately described it as a "myth", thereby provoking the very debate you claimed not to want. > I don't have time, nor the inclination to argue the truth of(sic) otherwise of the global warming / climate change myths. Since then you have raised no valid arguments, and indeed the arguments you did raise would embarrass even thoroughly discredited "sceptics" like Ian Plimer. Evidently you have not invested any effort at all into understanding the issues and the science. With the point about the distance to the Sun you have now ventured irretrievably into self-satire. Perhaps you are trolling, but trolls are supposed to be funny, and you fail even there. Tim Josling > From: Andrew McGlashan Subject: Re: [luv-talk] Fake Wikipedia entry on Bicholim Conflict finally deleted after five years To: luv-talk(a)lists.luv.asn.au Message-ID: <50F0FCA4.9010606(a)affinityvision.com.au> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 On 12/01/2013 4:29 PM, Craig Sanders wrote: > the following relevant excerpt from the Bad Astronomy blog may help you > understand: > > http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/01/02/perihelion_earth_is_clo… I've read that post before, and many similar, nothing changes for me. Did you read that I didn't want to debate this matter? I do not take as gospel truth the information provided by such (web)sites; particularly such sites that so strongly advocate a cause or belief which I personally and strongly believe to be false. Time, in the end, will tell, not any site like you've just presented (yet again). Kind Regards AndrewM

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Bouncing engines
by Allan Duncan 14 Jan '13

14 Jan '13

An engineering problem to exercise the intellect: I have a water pump powered by an air cooled diesel, all mounted in a frame which in turn sits on two skids parallel to the crankshaft. Air cooled diesels are noisy and leap up and down, a lot, and the pump likes to wander around. I wish to make an earthen pad to sit this on, but I would prefer not to tether it to stakes with bungee cords, as keeping a stake in the ground without the use of a concrete pad is iffy. So, what profile should this pad have, bath tub or mound? I think mound is the likely answer, but before I move the dirt I thought I'd throw it open for debate whilst I try searching on line for it.

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Re: [luv-talk] Fake Wikipedia entry on Bicholim Conflict finally deleted after five years
by Rick Moen 12 Jan '13

12 Jan '13

Quoting Russell Coker (russell(a)coker.com.au) > One thing that's always annoying is when people make wild claims offering no > evidence at all and then criticise people who reference Wikipedia. There are much better and saner criticisms one can make of Wikipedia. One is that many pages are crazy-quilt junkyards of maniacal detail-freakery. See xkcd parodies thereof: https://xkcd.com/214/ https://xkcd.com/739/ https://xkcd.com/444/ https://xkcd.com/446/ Another is that some of the articles are pretty much incoherent and utterly fail to cover their subjects -- possibly as a result of camel-like committee editing. (Old saying: A camel is a horse that was designed by a committee.) Example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor's_fallacy I happen to be a mathematics guy, and a Bayesian, so the really awful explanation at that page really pained me. Here's what I wrote about it on a mailing list: Quoting Terry W. Colvin (fortean1(a)mindspring.com) > Here's some examples of that sort of thing, generally called the > "Prosecutor's Fallacy" > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor's_fallacy#Conditional_probability By the way, intending no criticism whatsoever of you or Ray, Terry, but the explanation of that concept at Wikipedia is truly dreadful. I expect most people reading it will think 'Well, it's complex math stuff; I can't expect to understand it.' That's a pity, because it's not that difficult to explain -- I think. I'll have a try at it (borrowing from http://www.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/researchgp/spotlight/legal.html) If you know it's the midnight hour, you can determine the chance that it's dark outside (i.e., pretty certain). If you know it's dark, you can also calculate the likelihood that it's the midnight hour (non-zero but small). The point is that the odds of A given that you know B is NOT THE SAME as the odds of B given that you know A. Take that scenario to court: The prosecutor speaks as if he/she is calculating the odds that the defendent is innocent given the DNA evidence presented (B given knowledge of A). _However_, what he or she actually _presents_ are statistical calculations about how likely the DNA evidence would be present, given that the defendent is innocent (A given knowledge of B). And, the point is, these are just not the same thing at all, and calculating one 'conditional probability' tells you absolutely nothing about the other. In the UK court case mentioned on http://www.dcs.qmul.ac.uk/researchgp/spotlight/legal.html, prosecutors sought conviction of defendent mother Sally Clark (whose two babies had died) by having an expert testify that the probability of two cot deaths occurring in a single family was 1 in 73 million. To restate, the prosecutors presented the odds of two cot deaths in a single family, given that the mother is innocent of murdering them (A given knowledge of B). Unfortunately, that is not a relevant calculation: They needed to calculate the calculate the ENTIRELY DIFFERENT AND UNRELATED probability of the mother being innocent of murdering her children, given occurrence of two cot deaths in the family -- B given knowledge of A. (That actually ended up being an extremely unlikely 1 in 2 billion chance, completely the opposite of the picture that prosecutors had painted. Ms. Clark was unjustly convicted based on this entirely bogus probablistic argument. Her convictions were overturned after two appeals, but then quite understandably she then drank herself to death.) Yeah, and now I can anticipate the question: So, Rick, if you think Wikipedia's explanation of the Prosecutor's Fallacy is so wretched and opaque, and you are sure you can do better, why aren't you editing the page? I might. If anyone else wishes to do so, I give my blessing to anyone who wants to borrow any or all of the above.

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Lego now runs Linux
by thelionroars 11 Jan '13

11 Jan '13

I thought this was interesting. Lego's new Mindstorm kits are now running on Linux. Apologies in advance as the presentation of the video may not be to everyone's taste (but I don't mind Darren). From CES 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAQ3g-iW-Ow other links: http://www.linux.com/news/software/applications/688254-hackable-lego-robot-… http://linux.slashdot.org/story/13/01/08/0149241/lego-announces-gnulinux-po…

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Expect fireworks Saturday night
by David E Payne 10 Jan '13

10 Jan '13

The Chinese & Vietnamese Year of the Snake begins Sunday 13th January & I expect there will be plenty of fireworks despite laws & total fire bans. In my area probably much closer to home than there was during the Gregorian New Year (Daylight Savings Adjusted). That was pretty bad, the bitch next door escaped from a locked shed & came over to hide in our shed!?! After various moving around & close encounters of the first kind between her & my cat and a long period of quiet I eventually left her tied up on the front verandah of her place. When I was on my way to check on her later some jerks let off crackers a few houses away & she leapt over the railing into the garden. If the rope had been shorter she would have hung herself. Is the contribution of crackers to a celebration really worth torturing & terrifying animals including young children?

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Re: [luv-talk] ruby on rails, critical remote exploit
by achalmers＠westnet.com.au 09 Jan '13

09 Jan '13

>Now, does OpenBSD publish a web framework? I doubt that would help .. however: http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/man.cgi?query=style&format=html .. is a damn fine start. ALC

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ruby on rails, critical remote exploit
by Sam Watkins 09 Jan '13

09 Jan '13

Not sure if you all saw this. I'm not on luv-main, I guess it was mentioned there. http://arstechnica.com/security/2013/01/extremely-crtical-ruby-on-rails-bug… Extremely critical Ruby on Rails bug threatens more than 200,000 sites Servers that run the framework are by default vulnerable to remote code attacks. Now, does OpenBSD publish a web framework?

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