Patrick Chanezon: Perso

"Fireworks crackle, the year ends"

Fri, 31 Jan 2003 22:05:13 GMT

"Fireworks crackle, the year ends
Spring wind wafts, and I downed cups of wine
Early New Year morning, as sun shines bright
Every household is busy replacing old with new "

Wang Anshi (1021-1086)

Happy Chinese New Year to you all... and century ! It's 4700 tomorrow.
Year of the Goat... don't know what to make of that :-)

Quote of the Day

Tue, 17 Dec 2002 10:35:59 GMT

Quote of the Day.

"Life does not cease to be funny when people die any more than it ceases to be serious when people laugh." - George Bernard Shaw

Link Discuss

[The .NET Guy]

I went to a funeral last week. This quote is very relevant.

Charles Dupuis, 84, Publisher Who Introduced the Smurfs, Dies

Mon, 02 Dec 2002 11:54:40 GMT

Charles Dupuis, 84, Publisher Who Introduced the Smurfs, Dies. Charles Dupuis, a Belgian publisher of French-language comics, was best known in the U.S. for introducing the blue-hued, animated characters called Smurfs. By Eric P. Nash. [New York Times: Business]

That's a significant loss: smurfs are great.

Kids and their software developer parents

Mon, 02 Dec 2002 11:27:29 GMT

You did good.. My five year old son walked up behind me today as I toiled away on sample code for the chapter that I am working on, he saw the JUnit green bar on the screen, and said "Dad, you did good." [Blogging Roller]

I don't know if I envy him or not: I work from home since a few months and what I hear most often from my 4 years old daughter when she comes back from school in the evening is: "Papa, encore un p'tit mail et tu viens jouer avec moi" ("Dad, one more short mail and you come play with me !").

I guess it will soon be time to teach her logo :-)

Wed, 20 Nov 2002 17:10:26 GMT

Solaris: A New Dawn for Sci-Fi?. Science-fiction buffs madly debate online the merits of Steven Soderbergh's upcoming remake of an obscure Russian film. Could the new Solaris, starring George Clooney, signal a revival of smart sci-fi? By Jason Silverman. [Wired News]

No, that's not another Scott McNealy visionary talk, just a film.

I have seen the version from Tarkovski but I didn't like it very much. I haven't read the book.

Neuros HD 20GB MP3 Digital Audio Computer

Thu, 14 Nov 2002 13:57:57 GMT

Neuros HD 20GB MP3 Digital Audio Computer

Cool !

Halloween for geeks

Thu, 31 Oct 2002 17:29:18 GMT

Happy Halloween. No Halloween here, but this cheered me up: :-D

-Russ [Russell Beattie Notebook]

No Halloween in France either, but Laura, our american Au Pair showed my daughter how to carve a pumpkin.

A pearl of wisdom by Sam "gardener" Ruby

Wed, 30 Oct 2002 15:44:58 GMT

Planting a seed.

When I was in my twenties, I did not respect authority. I colored outside the lines. When a teacher or a boss told me what they thought I should do, I asked "why?". Most didn't like this much. When I told others what to do, they didn't ask me why, nor did they particularly enjoy the experience. I found the satisfaction of being able to tell them "I told you so" later to be quite hollow.

When I was in my thirties, I did not respect authority. Telling people what to do and asking "why" continued to yield similar results with people who "ranked" higher than me. But I found that more and more people were coming to me and asking me for my opinion. Some of them even asked why. Those that did seemed to like the fact that I would try to answer the question. Once, one of the people who had sought my opinion remarked about my tendency to color outside of the lines. My response was instantaneous: "What lines?".

Now, I am forty. I still do not much respect authority. I still occasionally ask why. But mostly I plant seeds. I do things that cause other people to ask why. Generally, the response is along the lines of "why not?". When asked for clarifications, I rarely respond with generalities any more, I try to cite specifics. It doesn't always work right away, but I've learned to be patient. Trying to rush things that can't be rushed doesn't work.

I rarely have the opportunity to tell people "I told you so" any more. Instead, I now have people who come back to me and say, "it would have been more helpful had you been more direct in the first place". To which, I smile, nod politely, and resume my planting of seeds.

[Sam Ruby]

A pearl of wisdom.

I'm not 40 yet :-)

A Joyce site

Wed, 30 Oct 2002 13:46:13 GMT

Work in Progress, A Website Devoted to the Writings of James Joyce

How local CNN really is

Wed, 30 Oct 2002 12:07:16 GMT

All about TV.

...
Right now, watching CNN-International doesn't do it. They have these weird foreign anchors... I used to live in Atlanta and had a friend who worked for CNNi. I got a tour of their studios, etc. It's all based out of Atlanta, why the HELL do they have heavily accented anchors when the main viewing audience is Americans??? All their news is 100% US-oriented, it's not like someone from here is going to watch and think "ooh boy, here's where I'm going to get my news." I have problems with CNN anyways. Live in Atlanta and you realize how local it really is. They'll have a spot on some international incident, then walk downstairs and interview some idiot on the street in Georgia about his feelings. Please.
...

-Russ [Russell Beattie Notebook]

I never liked CNN's pretense at being a global media altogether. When traveling abroad I prefer the BBC. Maybe this is just a European bias I have :-)

Russel's point of view as an American who used to live in Atlanta just reinforces this opinion.

An original way to get your MP3s in the living room

Mon, 14 Oct 2002 17:26:38 GMT

Toys.

But the coolest toy of the day (ordered from Amazon) is the Turtle Beach AudioTron 101. This is a piece of stereo-sized/shaped equipment that is designed to play MP3 and WMA files, as well as streaming MP3 and Windows Media.

The design is quite simple: it has both Ethernet and HPNA for network connectivity, and analog and digital audio output. On startup, it grabs an IP address via DHCP and scans the network for machines with shares (Windows or Samba) that contain music. It automatically categorizes the music using the MP3 tags or the data embedded in WMA files. The front panel sports a 40 character x 2 row interface that makes it easy to navigate music by artist, album, or genre, and quickly and easily play the music.

[The .NET Guy]

Cool indeed !

Derniere demeure de Mamema sur le Web

Fri, 04 Oct 2002 01:12:22 GMT

Derniere demeure de Mamema sur le Web, une petite page pour se souvenir de Mamema.

Ce qu'Alice represente pour moi, un de ses petits enfants , un petit texte que j'ai lu a l'eglise mercredi.

Mamema est morte

Mon, 30 Sep 2002 12:01:17 GMT

Mamema, ma grand mere, Alice Sexauer, est morte samedi 28 septembre 2002 a l'age de 93 ans.

Les funerailles auront lieu a Strasbourg mercredi a 14h30, eglise du sacre coeur, pres de la montagne verte, sur la route ostwald.

Je suis effondre.

Voici une photo d'elle avec ma mere et mon fils en fevrier 2002.