Aquarionics

Kitchtastic

So, we watched Eurovision. Greece won. Voters stupid.

LoneCat pinched most of my jokes, so you can read it over there :-)

The Javascript Future Event

So, I’m sitting in the basement of a bar somewhere slightly south of the River Thames at the Javascript Conference Thing. Arriving late, I was consigned to the edges somewhat, as the mass of people has taken over a RAID (That’s Redundant Array of Inexpensive Desktops) in a corner of the bar. We’ve broken up to get more beer, so I’m taking the oppertunity to compose stuff. The Wonder of WIFI not having made it to this basement, I’ll have to post it when I get back. Should have downloaded SubetherEdit before I left, really.

The major subject, as you might expect, is the migration from Document.write and friends over to the Brave New World of DOM-based scripting, and how to get the world to migrate to this from the other in much the same way as the Web Standards Project convinced the world that Tables-based design was no longer acceptable. The fact they managed this is going to help us more than a little, as CSS designs are far easier to Hijax (That’s the new term for Hijacking a page using AJAX, as invented… about 15 seconds ago), but we have something of a public relations mountian to climb to convince the world at large that Javascript isn’t just for mouseovers anymore.

To follow the same path as the CSS people, we need better discussion (along the lines of css-d), better examples (Blue robot, for example) and a figurehead (Dunstan has been nominated God Of Javascript. nobody is yet worshiping. As a matter of fact, he’s sitting in front of me eating a burger, which is ungodlike. It should at least be glowing, or something. Maybe some pineapple as a halo. Anyway. The God of Javascript is attempting to protect his chips from Aquarius.)

Not really sure what I can contribute here, really. Still working on ways we could converse better. Someone mentioned “A List Apart”, and my mind’s gone into invention mode, bringing back from the gumbo of half-formed ideas “B-List Apart”, a sort of Kuro5hin (Probably using Scoop) specifically for web development and AJAX-style articles.

Anyway, the discussion moves on.

(Later, from the train)

We need a mind-shift in the Intranet world. Jeremy Keith suggests a series of back-to-basics articles, to introduce people who want to learn about the Brave New World into it. Someone who’s identity I didn’t catch is going to organise a mailing list.

At this point we kind of split up, those who remained went upstairs and geeked possible ways of solving the OnLoad problem, on which Dean was authoritative. Shortly afterwards, I left.

It was good to meet/see people, and it was good to discuss this. The pub was nice, the food was good too, and there wasn’t a single non-mac laptop on the table.

People Who Were There:

• Me (Aquarion, Checked shirt, black glasses)
• Simon Willison
• Stuart who is Aquarius
• Dean Edwards of the IE7 that isn’t IE7
• Jeremy Keith who does indeed have cooler hair than you.
• Nick Fitz
• Many, Many other people whose names I didn’t catch, which is going to prove very embarrassing when I find out they are people whose weblogs I’ve read for years.

Talk like a pirate day

So, I’m sat here at work, and it’s Talk Like Pirate Day. So I’m going to do what I did last time I mentioned it.

The Pirate Training Day sketch

Which is _my_ MP3, despite the fact that someone called “Steve” posted it to Boing Boing last month. Which I didn’t notice, because I don’t read it.

Untitled

Sainsburys sold LoneCat a pumpkin today (They obviously read the rant on the subject last week :-). It is specially labeled as being “edible”, and I can’t help but wonder at the alternative. Do they have massive stocks of inedible pumpkins? Is it to stop people trying to eat the plastic ones?

Enquiring minds want to know…

Bashism

The, You know, Christmas thing.

May you all have a happy chri holida last few days of the year, and a fine and happy 2006, filled with health, wealth and happiness.

Except you, I’ll be getting your share.

Haul

Christmas, then.

• Socks. It is traditional that people get socks for christmas, so therefore the fact that my stocking (Which is the same Snoopy stocking I’ve had for at least two decades now) socks in it, as well as chocolate, a clementine, and the first City of Heroes book.
• CDs (Yay Music)
• The entire first season of the Muppet Show on DVD
• Star Wars: Clone Wars Season 2
• Yet more chocolate (Yay grandparents)
• A tumble dryer for the new flat (Okay, I got this a week ago, but it was still a christmas present. It’s good. On the one hand, it’s a tumble dryer and I need a tumble dryer because I can’t live my life drying clothes on the Cat5 strung up in the bathroom, if only because I’ll end up running experiments on how I can monitor the dryness of the clothes by the ping time across the wire. On the other hand, it’s so shockingly domestic I want to go hide under the duvet until the real world goes away again)
• A combination kettle/liquidizer. Basically, it’s a machine that heats stuff as it mixes stuff, and therefore makes capachino quite well. Also domestic, but in a fun studenty way, rather than a distressing adulty way.

My brother is one of the limited number of people in the universe to own an XBox 360 at the moment, and the fact that he doesn’t get to play on it until he visits his girlfriend after lunch is the kind of neato-cool torture that elder brothers enjoy more if they are the one causing it.

Got the Wireless network working, for certain values of. I’m reminded how much I hate dealing with Wireless networking in Windows (Especially when you have the Windows Wireless Wizzard fighting for control against the card’s native software), and the fighting to find an encyption system that both the Windows machines and the Macs (My Powerbook and my mum’s brand new iMac) can talk. I did find one – WPA - but then the Netgear software started crashing on startup. Bastard thing.

So, presents, check. Movies, check. Socks, check. Tech Support, check.

Family Christmas. Check. Now to go watch the Muppet Show.

Merry Christmas

Okay, I’ve got three Lovefilm trial accounts (two months free trial of the Lovefilm online DVD rental service, worth about 25 each) to give away to the first three people who express an interest in them by commenting on this entry (LJ users, the website, not the LJ feed). Existing LF users can’t use them, otherwise I’d swap mine with my mums and get six months free :-)