blog.ariffic
Archive for the ‘WTF?’ Category
« Previous EntriesMore of WordPress’s crap
So it turns out that in WordPress (at least the newest version - I don’t know about older versions), by default, you can’t have an RSS feed show full-text - it only shows excerpts. The culprit? This snatch of code from wp-includes/feed-rss2.php:
<?php if (get_option('rss_use_excerpt')) : ?>
<description><![CDATA[<?php the_excerpt_rss() ?>]]> |
<?php else : ?>
<description><![CDATA[<?php the_excerpt_rss() ?>]]> |
Seriously, guys, that’s just sloppy damned coding. I would assume it was on purpose if it weren’t for the fact that in the lines immediately following, which go over the content of the <content:encoded> element, are written correctly. Way to go, WordPress!
Anyone, for anyone wanting full-text RSS feeds, just convert the second call to the_except_rss() to the_content().
Why can’t NewsGator count?
It’s crap like this that keeps me switching NewsGator back to its Classic Reader. (Hint: look at the page count on the lower-right corner of the screenshot.)
In their rush to jump on the AJAXified Web-2.0 bandwagon, NewsGator neglected to see if their product could, you know, count properly. This bug has existed for at least four months - hell, it’s existed as long as the new ‘beta’ reader has - and it’s very simple to reproduce. Here’s how you do it.
0) Turn on the ‘mark items read as I view them’ option.
1) Click on a folder.
2) Start reading by using the ‘next page’ buttons.
By about the second or third page, the page counts will be horribly out of sync.
You had a good thing going for you, NG - why’d you have to go and screw it up with this crappy ‘beta’ reader?
PC question
An idle thought: anyone ever heard of problems caused by a hard drive that was on the same IDE chain as the primary hard drive, but not connected to a power supply?
I replaced my PC’s old clicky 30 GB Maxtor hard drive (from my IBM desktop circa 2001) with a new Western Digital 160 GB 7200 rpm hard drive on Sunday, and also added an extra 1 GB (2 x 512 MB) of RAM. After that, I would periodically have complete freezes of the OS. Today they’ve been especially pernicious, sometimes not letting Windows make it past the boot screen.
I tried running a RAM diagnostic on the memory but after 6 passes it found no errors, so I figured that wasn’t the culprit. Just to be sure, I completely took out the new RAM (still froze up) and then put back in the new and removed the old (still froze up). So I figured, well, heck, it’s probably been about a year and a half since I installed Windows on this thing. Time for a refresh.
Rebooted, started the XP reinstall process, deleted my old partition, added a new one, formatted it, aaaaand… froze up copying Windows files to the hard drive. So that got me thinking. My IDE chain setup was as follows:
- Chain 1:
- Hard drive, WD 160 GB, jumpers set to ‘cable select’
- Hard drive, Maxtor 30 GB, jumpers set to ‘master’ but no connection to power supply - so technically the computer shouldn’t even realize it’s there
- Chain 2:
- DVD+RW drive, some random brand
- Empty
It’s currently three or four steps into the install process, so there’s no saying it won’t freeze up again, but I was wondering: has anyone ever heard of a PC having problems due to an unpowered hard drive on the IDE chain?
What the heck is an Antifoni?
Did you know there’s an entire blog dedicated to Ohio IKEA stores? It’s true. Apparently West Chester is getting one in about 5 months. I can’t imagine there’d be that much news about Ohio IKEA stores, but apparently I have been proven wrong.
Apparently.
(Incidentally, the Antifoni is a table lamp.)
Since I know at least a few people who like to laugh at furries
Click the picture to see it at its original size.
From Boing Boing comes word of a furries vs. Klingons bowling tourney in Atlanta that, sadly, is not real.
This Saturday, Atlanta’s Midtown Bowl will see the second annual Klingons vs Furries bowling tournament, in a mighty subcultural clash. It’s like Quadrophenia with furrs and trekkers instead of mods and rockers.
Unfortunately, as one of the Klingons explains:
I am one of the Klingons in the photo (tall one back row far right). This event was not presented to our Klingon (KAG) group as a challenge. The challenge was between the STAR TREK club, and not the Klingon club.
The OP of the ad made this up. The challenge was never accepted because it was never offered.
While this event WILL PROBABLY happen in the future, it will not happen this Saturday. No Klingons are available on such short notice, and many of our best bowlers are off-world (cough) doing, um, Klingon stuff.
I admit I’m surprised how this is turning out to be so popular. Perhaps we can use this to benefit a sponsored charity.
What two nonsensical groups would you like to see in a sporting match? No sensible matchups like pirates vs. ninjas, you unimaginative curs.
I miss him already
Behold it
YOU CANNOT ESCAPE GUTS MAN’S ASS
Just keep watching it, trust me. Gets insane near the last 30 seconds or so.
Deal of the century
I can has Faberge egg?
He’s 90 stories tall, and his adventures are legendary
Stupid essays. Also, more stupid essays.
I chose Walt Whitman for my biography report because Mr. Farlow said that if I wasn’t going to take this class seriously and pick a real poet I may as well not come to class anymore. Walt Whitman was an awful child molester who was born in ancient Hong Kong. He is over 3,000 years old and remembers the names of all the forgotten Gods.
The one on atoms is pretty good, as is “Preserving the Future: The Fight to Save Pop Rocks.”
Enter the Hall of Monitors… IF YOU DARE
Ever wonder what happens if you plug the video out on your computer’s video card to the video in on your computer’s video capture card?
WONDER NO MORE!
I don’t know what I’d do if it wasn’t for the Internet doing all the things I’d never have thought to do first.
Monster.com has no idea what Kentucky looks like
Was browsing Monster yesterday for all jobs in Northern Kentucky when I noticed their map of Kentucky was… ahhh… a bit peculiar. This is Kentucky as Monster sees it (click for the full-size image):
Monster basically thinks that
- Western Kentucky extends nearly into where Lexington actually is
- Louisville takes up a quarter of the state
- Lexington is in the northern part of Kentucky
- Northern Kentucky is, in fact, not in the northern part of Kentucky, and apparently contains where Lexington really is
All of these are patently false. Just to emphasize why this is so wrong, here’s an actual map of Kentucky. Again, click for full size:
- Louisville is roughly in the position Monster thinks it is, but it’s not that big. It may be the only one they came close to getting right.
- Lexington is in the center of the state. You know, south of where Monster thinks it is.
- Northern Kentucky is roughly where Covington is on the real map, and doesn’t encompass nearly the area Monster thinks it does - you know, where common sense says it should be. Furthermore, where N.Ky is on Monster’s map, there needs to be a 5th region: Eastern Kentucky.
- Western Kentucky isn’t that big. Settle down, Hilltoppers.
So in short - who the hell makes these maps?
(And no wonder I keep getting job offers out of Louisville. They think it’s in my backyard!)
The US Postal Service: When you absolutely, positively don’t give a damn whether it arrives or not
Ever tried tracking something via the US Postal Service’s website?
This is a screenshot of a tracking page for an item that was shipped to me two days ago.
Note that the tracking page says “Electronic shipping info received.”
It will continue to say this until the package arrives, at which time it will change to “Delivered.” What the hell’s the point?
When this happened to me once, I figured it was a glitch or something. Then it happened again. And again. And again.
Fool me once… strike one.
Fool me twice… strike three.
Hey everyone!
Remember how the U.S. moved Daylight Savings time up three weeks?
Remember how it was supposed to save us energy?
It worked, right?
Turns out we saved pretty much nothing.
Why is it…
… that TV news people are always so hilariously uninformed about technology, gadgetry, the Internet, or reality in general?
Also, is everything a tool for pedophiles? Frigging everything?
13375p34k means you like sexin’ kids!
Idiocy abounds
Okay, that’s it, the U.S. patent system is fucked up. Someone patented the linked list:
A computerized list is provided with auxiliary pointers for traversing the list in different sequences. One or more auxiliary pointers enable a fast, sequential traversal of the list with a minimum of computational time. Such lists may be used in any application where lists may be reordered for various purposes.
A quick, simple, and not completely factually correct primer for anyone with no CS background: a linked list is basically where you have a series of objects that contain references to the next object in the list (and sometimes to the previous object; this is a doubly-linked list). An example would be if you walked up to me (I’m an object) and asked me where my coworker sits. I know where they are (the reference), and following my reference pointer (pun fully intended, C++ nerds may laugh now) you would find the next ‘object’ in the ‘list’ - my coworker.
Here’s the retarded part:
The date on the patent? Filed September 26, 2002; granted April 11, 2006.
The linked list? Developed in 1955-56.
I cannot stress how absolutely dumbfounded I am that this patent has been granted. Linked lists are a fundamental structure in computer science for doing any sort of list processing. It’s one of the primary data structures in Lisp. It is in textbooks everywhere; I did at least six implementations in my first two years of college.
I’m not a lawyer, so maybe someone can clue me in: is the USPTO not required to do any research for ‘prior art’ (or whatever the hell you’d call it in this case) and just rely on the idea that the first one to patent something is the first person to come up with it?
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