At the end of days, at the end of time
When the Sun burns out will any of this matter

Who will be there to remember who we were?

Who will be there to know that any of this had meaning for us?

Let me join the line of fanboys as Mark Pilgrim paves the semantic way.

I am but a padawan learner in the ways of the semantic web, but I learn fast. Every now and then I stumble upon some new way of improving the semantics, getting me ever so closer to the Web Nirvana.

I knew that the <cite> tag existed, but I never really knew what it was about. Sure, you use it for citations. But I had to see an example before I could see the usefulness of it.

I’m already thinking about how to add an archive for this to MovableType, but I suppose the LazyWeb™ will get it done before I even get started. Besides, I need to have a look at the MT API first..

Next question. What tag is really best to use when writing file names, console commands or HTML tags in the text? I like to display them differently to mark that it’s not a normal word. So far I have been using <tt>, but is <kbd> better? Or <code>, though I suppose it’s mostly for larger blocks of code?

Update: Now that I think about it, <code> is a pretty obvious change. Time for a search and replace en masse.

I’ve been talking quite a bit with Breki about Wing Chun, a martial art that he recommended, since he’s going to start training it this spring. I’m seriously considering joining him. It seems to be pretty much what I’m looking for: it’s based almost entirely on speed and dexterity, not strength. It’s equally offensive and defensive, with the following meme:

Wing Chun is a counter fighting system. Ninety-five percent of Wing Chun hand techniques are countering applications. Only five percent of the system can be used offensively and then in only the direst situations. The system is heavily influenced by the Buddhist founders and lacks offensive opening moves. In Wing Chun, defense is the offense.

In other words, Wing Chun isn’t about starting fights, it’s about ending them. Making the last blow is better than making the first.

But I’m not interested in beating the crap out of people. As mentioned in a previous post, I’m mainly interested in improving my physical condition. Going to the gym would probably bore me very quickly, and I’ve never been the kind of guy who would enjoy running around on a lawn chasing an inflated pig stomach. A martial art, however, sounds more fun. The philosophy intrigues me.

Historically, it’s 2-300 years old, depending on what sources you read — here’s one, for starters. Wing Chun was, supposedly, the martial art that Bruce Lee started with.

Update: here is a video (3,0Mb, now hosted locally) showing Wing Chun sparring against a dummy. Looks very swift and fluid. Yup, I might like training this.

I found a short editorial on Gamespy’s Game of the Year 2002 section, that was so good I decided to blockquote it in its entirety.

There was a time when adventure games were still not only plentiful, but actually dominated the gaming industry. In the early days of PC gaming, some of the most recognized brands belonged to Sierra, and ended in the word “Quest.” These games presented interesting stories, accessible gameplay, and puzzles that were at least somewhat logical (as opposed to the often bizarre types that are found in modern adventure titles). Now they’re gone, and there’s no real reason for it.

Aside from the notorious difficulty of making logical text-parsing interfaces, it’s relative child’s play to duplicate the functionality of the old Sierra games with modern tech, using all of the nifty 3D bells and whistles we’ve come to expect. A team could easily use any modern, licensable 3D engine to create a system of rooms or areas that you could explore, from an isometric perspective, with camera changes as you went from room to room. A decent team of designers could create, in 3D, a map the same size as the one found in Sierra’s Quest for Glory in just a few months.

The rest of the time could be spent on the gameplay itself. Make the puzzles inventive but comprehensible; the dialog crisp, witty and refreshing; the interface smooth and easy to use. The adventure genre isn’t dead… it simply wandered off the path at some point and became weird and inbred. With a little effort, the types of game we often reminisce about could be brought to a whole new audience.

That’s something I’ve asked myself many times: where did all the adventure games go? I still have very fond memories of The Secret of Monkey Island (Link to Monkey 4 since I couldn’t find a product page for Monkey 1) and Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers.

Here’s a real one. No geek stuff added. Promise.

I will get in better physical condition in 2003. I’ve for a long time been thinking about starting working out. I really need to get in better physical condition. It’s mostly a certain biological feature of mine called “pectus excavatum” that has sowed doubt in me, but I don’t doubt I can overcome that if I’m just motivated.

Thanks to my chest and lungs, I get winded very quickly. I’ve been told that swimming is good training for your respiratory tract, but I can’t swim. (I can’t whistle either.)

I’ve been thinking about starting with some martial art (training with staff or sword would be nice), but first I need to improve my overall condition. Hence, I’ll start at the gym in order to get my condition up to gear.

One word review: “Wow!”

When I switched from Opera 6 to Mozilla, I thought I had found my weapon of choice when it came to web browsers. I knew that Opera 7 would have lots of new stuff, but I decided to stick with Mozilla anyway. But now I’m starting to have second thoughts.

Opera 7 is slick. The new GUI is sweet to look at. It may be considered unnecessary bells and whistles, but I really like it. One feature alone really sold me on Opera: <rel> navigation.

Consider this image. See that blue bar below the address bar? That’s the navigation bar, that gets populated with links from the currently browsed document. See how some of them are disabled? That’s because they aren’t defined in the document.

I added relevant (no pun intended) <rel> tags to most of my site, and it is used in the example image. Individual entries have navigation links to the next and previous entry, and the “up” button takes you to the calendar view for that month. “Index” gives you the trashcan, “Copyright” displays the Creative Commons license, and “Author” gives you the currently non-existing page about me.

But that was just the pure graphical side of Opera 7. I haven’t had a look under the hood yet, but I’m sure there’s nothing but good stuff there. I’ll stick with Opera 7 for a while and take it for a ride.

Update: Added “Search.” It still uses the default MT template and is thus ugly as hell at the moment. This is currently the only way to access the search function. Threaten me with sharp, pointy implements of destruction if you want it available in the sidebar.

My apprentice is doing well. He’s ensnared another being into our splinter cell.

Welcome to the fold.

better !pout !cry
better watchout

lpr why

santa claus town

cat /etc/passwd >>list
ncheck list

ncheck list

cat list | grep naughty >>nogiftlist

cat list | grep nice >>giftlist

santa claus town

who | grep sleeping
who | grep awake

who | grep bad || good

for (goodness sake) {

be good }

(Via Boing Boing.)

Darnit. Durandal caught a virus. W32.Weird.

I don’t have the slightest idea where it came from, but apparently it’s not activated until you run Internet Explorer, which I did yesterday for the first time in a very long while. I use Mozilla otherwise. Five minutes later, Windows complained about system files that had been changed. That quickly rang a bunch of warning bells in my head.

Well, I downloaded a trial of Norton Antivirus 2003, which is currently hunting the virus down. 224 infected files so far. Whee.

This virus could be dangerous if you’re not properly firewalled — it opens a port and listens for commands. In essence, your ass is owned if you’re infected and open to the net and you don’t discover it and wipe it out.

Yet another reason why I’m not using Windows for anything else but computer games and some Photoshopping.

Magnus and Cecilia dropped by earlier today and gave us some Christmas candy, a chocolate-dipped marzipan pig (is that a localized Swedish custom?) and a few bottles of cider (and Coke, since we’re geeks after all). Thanks for making me smile. Group hug!

Now, if I only knew what “knäck” and “lussekatt” is in English…