I'm really irritated with streaming video sites like ifilm.com and even the local wthr.com website. I run Linux. I don't run Windows. Their websites berate me and insult my intelligence because of this. One can only speculate why they would do such a thing when the technology exists to make their website and streaming video work effortlessly.

My advice to WTHR.com and iFilm.com: Fire whoever is running your websites. Or at least smack them upside the head with a cluebat.

WTHR.com throws up a red warning message telling me that my operating system and/or browser are not supported. At that very moment the video window opens and the video they say I can't watch starts playing in all of its craptacular Windows Media Video garbled glory. Then it further demands that I install Internet Explorer 6. Tell me, why shouldn't I just go to CNN instead? CNN opted to not insult me. Instead they support Real Player which runs natively on Linux and supports Mozilla Firefox. And further CNN doesn't just assume that my browser won't work. They don't even try to stop me from making a seemingly stupid choice like selecting Windows Media Video format.

iFilm.com tells me that I need to install Real ONE player and totally locks me out of their website. Why in the world would I want to install an old, buggy Real ONE player? I have Real Player 10 Gold for Linux installed. If I tell Firefox to pretend that it is Internet Explorer 6 on Windows then iFilm lets me watch the videos fine using none other than Real Player 10 Gold for Linux. I will suffer without iFilm, thank you. Why? I don't want them to get the impression that the entire world runs IE. Maybe one day they'll look at the number of Firefox or Linux users who simply leave their website at the "Go away we don't want your money" popup.

After telling Firefox on Linux to pretend to be Internet Explorer 6 on Windows I was presented with a perfectly working video interface with quite high quality video. The buttons are a bit cramped because they make some bad assumptions but it is still perfectly usable. (Note: you can't see the actual video in the screen capture due to Real Player's overlay):

I've started working on a Python language binding for the Swish-e search engine. All of the basic functionality works. I have provided an example script which prints the results in a similar format as the swish-e program. The example script serves as the documentation for now. Swish-python doesn't yet handle the index headers. Header functions pass back an object reference which you can't yet use.

swish-python 0.1 can be downloaded as a source tarball or a debian package.

On July 08 2004 I made a native Linux build of the makensis command from the Nullsoft Scriptable Install System (NSIS). NSIS is a popular programming tool which allows you to create installers (i.e. setup.exe) for Windows software by writing simple scripts. Since my computers run Linux I build Windows software using a GCC cross-compiler based on MinGW. So, I needed NSIS to run on Linux and create a Windows setup.exe. It turned out that NSIS can be run on Linux and I documented the process I used to build a Linux version of makensis.

Lately I have been migrating my computers from Fedora Core to Ubuntu Linux. So I have repackaged makensis as a Debian package for Ubuntu Linux along with a GPG signature. (Incidentally, does anyone know how to sign a Debian package so it can be verified? Never works and installing debsign-verify prevents everything from installing.)

Lintian complains about some things because of the way I had to package it. This version of makensis acts like a Windows program. As such, it wants its executable name to be makensis.exe and requires all of its config files to be in the same directory as makensis.exe. So, I wrote a /usr/bin/makensis shell script and placed the real files into /usr/lib/makensis.

I'm not sure if there's a way to make Lintian happy without modifying the makensis code. Then again, maybe those problems are solved in a newer version. I don't really want to update to a newer version right now because makensis often changes its script language between versions.

To make the package a little more user friendly I followed some of Lintian's advice. I created a makensis(1) man page by running halibut --man=makensis.1 usage.but in the Docs/src directory. I tweaked the output from halibut according to the Man Page HOWTO. And I copied the HTML documentation into /usr/share/doc/nsis.

Here's an amusing Novell Linux advertisement that makes light of the abandonment of Windows NT 4 by Microsoft.

This highlights the defining difference between Windows and Linux. With Linux, a particular company isn't selling you the limited, revokable right to use their systems. The company is selling you their services to maintain and repair your systems. That's right folks, Linux is as much your system as it is theirs. Maybe those support services even cost more than a bucket full of Windows licenses. But there's no expiration date on when you need a problem solved. If there is a problem then the people you are paying should fix it. And, with Linux, if they don't fix it to your satisfaction you can grab the phone book and find someone else who will. Or you can even fix the problem yourself if you have the skills.

With an "abandoned" version of Windows your only recourse is to spend a fortune to upgrade every piece of hardware and software you own and then hope the problem has been solved. And if it hasn't been solved then you may be allowed to file a problem report on the newer version. But for the average business a problem report filed with Microsoft comes explicitly without any expectation that the problem will ever be fixed. And sometimes when it is fixed you'll find it is only provided with an upgrade to a new version.

Mike Palmer, N9FEB and myself have been working on the Indianapolis-Marion County Ham Radio website a bit over the past few weeks. The primary focus is information for communications volunteers helping with Indianapolis and Marion County area festival, parade, triathlon, marathon, bicycle race, and emergency events.

Who?
The information listed there is for Amateur Radio, often called Ham Radio, operators who help coordinate communications between Red Cross, local government, or other agencies in the Indianapolis area. Surprisingly often event organizers rely on cell phones or cheap recreational radios to communicate. Unfortunately, most volunteers they have on hand are inexperienced in dealing with situations requiring complex communications. During a large event this can be dangerous. During an emergency it can be deadly. Amateur Radio can help alleviate these problems.

In many communities there are, often large, groups of Amateur Radio operators willing to offer their communications skills just for the experience of doing so. By federal law, US Amateur Radio operators cannot provide their services for pecuniary interest. Meaning, they can't be paid in any way for the use of their radios. So, it's a perfect fit with charity and government sponsored events. And it provides Amateur Radio operators with a chance to practice their communications skills. Skills which often prove valuable in large-scale emergency situations.

What?
For example, in places Amateur Radio operators provided the only means of communications in the initial days following the Tsunami and Earthquake in Asia in December 2004. The existing infrastructure had been completely destroyed in those areas but hams were able to step in and communicate worldwide using portable radios on battery and generator power. Hams frequently help coordinate wildfire activities in the Western US. Hams assisted NASA in locating widely dispersed wreckage from the Columbia space shuttle accident. Hams are members of many search and rescue organizations. Hams also provide specialized radio support networks for other hams who are mariners, truck drivers, travelers, and so on. Most astronauts and all cosmonauts are Ham Radio operators. There is a permanent Ham Radio station aboard the International Space Station with voice, data, and video capabilities.

Thousands of Amateur Radio operators nationwide help the National Weather Service (NWS) every day by providing weather reports from remote areas via Ham Radio back to storm prediction centers. Amateur Radio operators are also a major force in Skywarn and storm chaser programs around the US. So much so that nearly all NWS offices have their own permanent Ham Radio stations operated by volunteers from the community. Hams also have a large network of automated weather observing stations which NWS/NOAA and others feed directly into storm prediction "mesonet" computers.

Thousands of US Hams are members of the Military Affiliate Radio Service (MARS) which, among other things, passes routine messages between far-off soldiers and family. Hams in MARS are assigned to military radio channels with military callsigns. They learn the details of military communications procedures so they can function as a fallback resource in case primary military communications infrastructure is overloaded or damaged. MARS has, at times, helped tested new communications technology before it is widely deployed.

How?
Hams have many means of communications available to them. The most common means of communications is short-range VHF/UHF FM. VHF/UHF radios are often small enough to fit into one's pocket. VHF/UHF generally covers an area of up to about 50 miles but can be extended by repeaters, IRLP, and satellites. Repeaters commonly cover tens to hundreds of miles. IRLP nodes use the Internet to interconnect repeater stations worldwide much like dialing a telephone number. Satellites can relay data and voice communications within a several thousand mile area. High orbit satellites are available for complex high power ground stations as well as low orbit satellites usable by handheld radios that fit in the pocket.

HF provides the only truly worldwide communications even though other methods come close. HF works by bouncing radio signals off ionized layers of the Earth's atmosphere. HF uses moderate amounts of power and requires a few dozen feet of wire for the antenna strung up in a tree or from a building. HF can be a bit unpredictable but an experienced operator can often find some way to make their contact. Newer digital communications modes make HF unpredictability much less troublesome.

For such large scale disasters like hurricanes, tsunami, and such Hams will coordinate local activities on VHF/UHF then relay summaries via HF to regional centers. VHF/UHF can operate several dozen miles without any infrastructure in place. HF doesn't work well at all for short range but can work very well beyond a hundred miles or so.

Well, as of today I have 50 Google Gmail invites. So if any friends or family want a Google Gmail account then let me know. Gmail is a fairly neat email service. Especially if you get a lot of mail or subscribe to busy mailing lists. I use it to read through mailing lists that get thousands of messages per day.

I don't use Gmail to send email only because it doesn't support PGP encrypted signatures. I always send email with an encrypted signature to prevent someone from forging email from me. If there's not a valid PGP signature then it is almost certainly not from me. My public PGP key is published to the keyservers. So, the validity of a given email can be checked automatically by an email program that supports PGP.