It's most often called the War on Terror, but terror is a tactic not an opponent. Our opponents are a collection of islamic jihadis and petty tyrants who want to destroy our modern, liberal, democratic, capitalist civilization.

Phil Carter and Austin Bay are debating our options. The first installment is about the viability of the all volunteer force in the current environment. I'd say that round one goes to Austin.

Yesterday's IPython sprint was a success. We had 12 programmers on site and one working remotely, but there was still more than enough to work on. Cary Miller and I decided to work on an improved interactive help facility which will rely on intelligent documentation search. We spent most of the day doing discovery. The closest thing to coding that I did was hacking the PyLucene make file to get it to build on Fedora 6.

I've done my homework in preparation for tomorrow's IPython1 Sprint, so hopefully I'll be productive.

UCSD researchers have demontrated a solar powered process that converts carbon dioxide into carbon monoxide and oxygen. The project was initiated to develop a method to produce oxygen for a Mars expedition, but the cabon monoxide is a feedstock for gasoline and various plastics. If this can be scaled commercially, it could help reduce both atomospheric carbon dioxide and dependence on fossil fuels.

Richard Gabirel points out that good writing is part of doing good science. It's also part of good engineering. If others can't understand what you've done, your work is, at best, only half done. You must communicate your ideas.

Popular Mechanics recommends essential tools for the home toolbox. I probably have these, but they're scattered across three tool boxes and a bench.

I've found a nice APL wiki created and hosted by APL Team LTD. It's a great resource for the APL community.

I'm back weight lifting again after a long layoff. I've lifted on and off most of my life, including some competetive powerlifting, but haven't done much since moving to Colorado in 2003.

I have arthritis, and have decided that a more regorous strength training regimen was in order. My mother had a knee replacement last month, and I'm probably a candiate one of these days if an effective way to replace cartilege isn't developed. Muscle stabilizes and cushions the joints, so maintaining muscle mass and strenth is one of the best ways to mitigate the effects of arthritis.

I've completed the first week of the beginners program in Challenge Yourself. It looks like a good plan for reentry, starting light and progressing over two six week cycles. We'll see how it goes, but so far my knees and shoulders are feeling better.

Clarence Bass has a good article on Weights and Arthritis. It's a good place to start if you have arthritis and are cosidering a strength training program.

The SIGAPL recovery effort is gaining momentum. We're set to hold our first conference since 2003 this October. Arrays and Objects: APL2007 will be held in Montreal in conjunction with OOPSLA2007.

Last night's Front Range Pythoneers meeting was a success. Matt Boersma brought the XO that he has for One Laptop Per Child development. He volunteerd to do a geneology program for it and is planning to port GRAMPS to the XO. The XO is essentially a Python machine, which makes GRAMPS a good candidate, though it's pretty big so Matt anticipates doing some sliming down and optimizing.

We also talked about software test methods and the upcoming IPython1 sprint over pizza and drinks.

Python 2.5.1 final is out.

In Challenge Yourself, Clarence Bass presents his approach to leanness, fitness, and health at any age. Clarence is an accomplished olymipc weight lifter, body builder, and all round fitness geek. His thing is extreme leannes, and while I don't aspire to that, I do need to lose a few pounds. He advocates a reasonable eating style (he'd rather not call it a diet), high intensity strength and aerobics training, and ample rest. At 69 he looks great, so this evidently works for him. He recognizes that with individual differnces, we are each an experiment of one, so he emphasizes general principals. He provides spcific recomendations as a starting point. Recommended for anyone interested in greater fitness.

Wally Rippel remembers meeting Richard Feynman as an undergrad at CalTech. He says that Feynman is an inspiration to many at Tesla Motors, as he should be to us all. He was brilliant yet down-to-earth, optimistic yet realistic.

The Python buffer protocol allows different objects to share a chunk of memory. PEP 3118 proposes that it be cleaned up and extended with metadata to make this sharing easier and more productive. This would make it easier for such things like NumPy, multi-media libraries, and database interfaces to work together.

Version 0.8 of IPython has been released. The enhanced interactive shell for Python continues to improve. See the What's New page for details.

NB. There's a Windows dependency for PyReadline 1.4 which hasn't been released yet, so for the time being this release is only for Linux, OS X, and other Unix-like systems.

Python 2.5.1, the first bug fix for Python 2.5, release candidate is out.

The Great Race of 1908 demonstrated to the world the viability of the Automobile for real world transportation. The Great Race organization has been conducting ralleys in the U.S. for the past 25 years and will conduct a New York to Paris ralley next year to commemorate the 1908 race. There are two classes of competition, classic cars, and hybrid/alternative fuel vehicles.

It's overcast and snowing on thie Easter Day in Colorado. I attended the early service this morning and have a turkey in the oven for the feast.

The Lord is my strength and my song, and he has become my salvation. -- Psalm 118:14

I love the direct feel and lighting quick responsiveness of my S2000, but it does get twitchy in slippery conditions. It likes to turn and you can feel every patch of ice, sand, or mud that a wheel touches. While the S2000 has a limited slip diffential and ABS, it doesn't have traction control. We had some snow and freezing rain last night and I planned to take the truck which likes to go in straight lines and has four wheel drive. Four wheel drive isn't magic, as some clueless drivers seem to think, but it does help in such condtions. Unfortunately, there was more ice on the truck than I had time to clear off, so I drove the S2000. It was fine, if less comfortable.

On his blog, Iain Morrison describes the Tesla Roadster cold weather testing on a frozen lake in Sweden. It does have traction control, which seems to work fine under regenerative braking as well as acceleration. Traction control can be switched off when you don't mind sliding a bit. When they get the cost down a bit, I'll be interested.

NumPy 1.0.2 has been released. From the Release Notes:

Draft Auto X-Prize rules have been posted for review and comment. The rules try to make the competition appealing to both existing auto manufacturers and newcommers. They seem to do this reasonably well, and it'll be interesting to see what kind of entries they get.