If you missed out on the Carla Schroder’s recent presentation, Control a World of Computers from Your Linux PC, you’re in luck. You can download and watch the webinar video (approx. 30 minutes, .mov file, 125 MB) here.
This week, Jonathan Zdziarski, one of the original hackers of the iPhone and author of iPhone Open Application Development demonstrates how you can use the iPhone open source tool chain to design third-party software that will run on on both today’s iPhones, and on iPhones that will soon be running Apple’s next version of firmware based on the official SDK. Jonathan will demonstrate on a Mac running Leopard.
Join us for the webcast on Thursday, April 3rd, at 10 am Pacific Daylight Time. It’s free. You can find more information and register here.
In my morning New York Times (which I still happily subscribe to), I stumbled upon a mention of our local Wi-Fi hullabaloo and the Radar blog in Dan Mitchell’s column, What’s Online. In it Mitchell writes:
TRIED TIN FOIL? The city of Sebastopol, Calif., was all set to offer free wireless Internet service. Then last week the City Council rejected the idea after several residents complained that the radio waves pose a health hazard. “I have had health challenges, and my body cannot handle Wi-Fi,” one resident was quoted as saying. “It gives me headaches and makes me very sick.”
Read the rest of Mitchell’s column here. To find out more about the Wi-Fi flap, read Dale Dougherty’s coverage on the Radar blog here.
Unless you’re up on geek lingo, “hacking” isn’t usually associated with a good group of people trying to fix programs and use shortcuts to solve problems. However, if you are involved in the geek community, hackers are a common commodity.
Since the 2nd edition was released in January, hackers and computer geeks all over the world are ready to tackle a whole new slew of problems and challenges with new tools.
Praise has come from various places, including Slashdot reviewer David Martinjak:
[This is] one of the quintessential books for its subject. A book this good is a rare find, and certainly worth the read for any individual interested in security.
A couple weeks ago I asked people to post a comment to this blog telling me what they considered to be beautiful code—if anything—or to offer any other thoughts on the subject. I said that I would pick one winner from among those who commented, in a totally arbitrary fashion, to receive a free copy of the book, Beautiful Code.
The contest is closed now. The comments people posted were all so good (find them here and here) that I find myself having trouble selecting a winner, especially in a totally arbitrary fashion. Just this once—and really, only just this once (not ever again) —I’ve decided to give up and declare everyone who posted a winner of this book. Thanks, everyone, for adding your thoughts to this conversation.
And, the conversation doesn’t have to end. Beautiful Code has its own site “Where leading programmers explain how they find unusual and carefully designed solutions.” You can follow insightful posts by Michael Feathers, Andy Oram, and other contributors to the book, and continue the conversation.
Tech Valley Code Camp comes to the Albany, NY area on April 19th, 2008 at New Horizons Computer Learning Center! Attend, present, get some great swag! Code Camp, Heroes and BarCamp–three great events, all on one day, all under one roof. This event is affiliated with Tech Valley .NET Users Group.
Sessions include “I’ve got WCF, now what?” by Andy Bandera and “Introduction to Game Development with XNA” by Chris Bowen.
Here in bucolic Sebastopol–and O’Reilly’s corporate headquarters in northern California, a rural-ish Sonoma County town about 60 miles north of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge–city officials recently rejected an offer of free Wifi downtown due to the possible health risks from radio frequency signals. Needless to say this EMF tempest in a (virtual) teapot has got us in a twitter; I mean titter.
I know the rejection of free Wifi may sound wacky. But I’ve lived in the area long enough that I remember when Sebastopol banned Styrofoam, passed a tree ordinance which prevented the chopping down of heritage trees without public oversight, and limited the times when the leaf blower set could fire up their noisy, polluting machines. But these community decisions also required lengthy and often heated public meetings–along with the added benefit of bringing people together in a spirit of shared responsibility.
So here we are again. (And don’t get me wrong, when it comes to Wifi I like it free.) But education may be key. So for those who are interested–folks who may want to weigh in on the discussion going on in Sebastopol, CA about free Wifi–and in the spirit of open-hearted public discource I offer this round up of recent posts and news stories.
Ira Flatow, host of NPR’s popular Science Friday, talks to O’Reilly’s E.A. (Emily) Vander Veer, author of “Facebook: The Missing Manual” about how to use Facebook and still keep control of your personal information. Science Friday broadcasts on Friday, March 21, 2 p.m. EDT. Emily’s discussion with Ira about Facebook starts in the second hour, about 3:15 p.m. EDT or so. We hope you tune in!
We invite you to register for the next O’Reilly Webcast taking place on Thursday, March 27 at 10 a.m. PDT (17 GMT). Presenter Derrick Story–digital photographer, blogger, and author of The Digital Photography Companion–gives you five ways to capture the high quality pictures you’ve always wanted. It’s your chance to learn how to polish your digital photos and ask Derrick questions, too.
Packed with valuable information, this free webcast from O’Reilly is less than an hour. Register now and we’ll send you a reminder.
In a recent commentary on NPR’s Marketplace Morning Report, O’Reilly’s “Myths of Innovation” author and former Microsoft employee Scott Berkun argues that stodgy Microsoft and freewheeling Yahoo! culture might share more similarities than we think.
Scott who has frequented the halls of both companies had this to say:
High-profile Valley companies have recruited at the same colleges for 20 years. You’ll find similarly high percentages of MIT, CalTech, Carnegie Mellon and Stanford graduates at Yahoo!, Google, Apple or Microsoft. And if today you were transported inside the hallways of these company’s project teams, you’d be hard-pressed to guess where you were — everywhere you’d see young, casual, passionate people, having fun while working hard as they develop technological solutions to all the world’s problems.”
But what I really want to know is your opinion. Are the differences between these two mythic companies, subtle at best? Leave your comment here and you just may win your own copy of “The Myths of Innovation.”
FYI— just realized that I had not enabled comments for the following post, and there I was wondering why no one had commented on it for a chance to win a free book. Because of that, I’ll extend the following contest, in which I choose a winner in a totally arbitrary fashion, until next the end of next Tuesday, March 25. Feel free to post your comments to the original post or here.
Here are the details:
Michael R. Bernstein wrote to let me know that I had neglected to announce the winner of the free copy of Ajax: The Definitive Guide that I offered in my post What’s in a Definitive Guide?” This was quite a coincidence (assuming you believe in coincidence) because Michael, himself, was the winner we arbitrarily chose. Congratulations, Michael and thank you for posting your insightful comments.
For the next book contest, I’m giving away a copy of the Jolt Award winning Beautiful Code. Just post a comment about the subject: what makes code beautiful to you? What makes it ugly? Can code be beautiful? Write whatever you like on the subject, post your comment before Friday, March 21, and I will arbitrarily select a winner from the posts. The odds of winning are great—just ask Michael!
Though the perception is rapidly changing, the techie world has long been considered the stomping grounds of guy geeks. Author and tech guru J.D. Biersdorfer is helping to level the playing field and remind us that iPod and iTunes technology favors no gender, writes O’Reilly’s Alisson Walsh.
Author of the “iPod: The Missing Manual” and “iPod Shuffle Fan Book ,” Biersdorfer has a way of using her technical knowledge to assist even the most technologically challenged among us. “Most people under the age of 30, who grew up with computers and technology as part of their daily lives, are probably not going to fear the iPod because they’re accustomed to this stuff,” she explains. “The people who have had the least exposure to digital technology will probably be the most apprehensive. It’s the fear of the unknown.”
Biersdorfer reminds people that they don’t have to know everything about a technology to be able to master it. “Don’t be afraid of it,” she says. “You’re smarter than it is!”
Biersdorfer also admits that it’s hard to keep up with Apple, which offers constant updates and new products. “If you’re not an ‘Apple Obsessive,’ there are plenty of sites on the Web to help,” she says. “Although it’s based on speculation and industry gossip, The Mac Rumors Buying Guide keeps tabs on Apple’s product line and is pretty good at predicting when updates may arrive.”
For the complete interview with J.D. Biersdorfer, click here.
In the spotlight: Tim O’Reilly, founder of O’Reilly Media, appears on the front page of Sunday’s New York Times-owned Press Democrat.
“This is the life of O’Reilly: Founder of Sebastopol-based O’Reilly Media and a visionary who connects people and ideas in order to turn technological possibilities into realities,” writes reporter Nathan Halverson. “His ability to spot revolutions in science before they happen is legendary in the tech world, and is often referred to as the ‘O’Reilly Radar’.”
Coming in April, O’Reilly has a new graphic novel aimed at kids (and their parents and teachers). Hackerteen probes the modern online world where more and more kids are spending their time. It tells a great story while teaching young readers about basic computing and Internet topics, including the potential for victimization. The book is also ideal for parents and teachers who want to communicate the risks of using the Internet and the proper ways to behave online. Watch the trailer; get the book!
The next O’Reilly Webinar takes place on Wednesday, March 19 at 10:00am PDT (17:00 GMT). Carla Schroder, columnist, blogger, and author of the Linux Cookbook and Linux Networking Cookbook, covers the finer points of secure remote graphical administration from your Linux PC, showing how to run graphical applications, your favorite desktop, remote helpdesk, and even control a Windows machine from Linux. It’s been said that any sysadmin would benefit from Carla Schroder’s know-how. This is your chance to get it first-hand.
The webinar is free, the duration is less than an hour, and is packed full of valuable information. Register now and we’ll send you a reminder.
Congratulations are in order for Derrick Story, O’Reilly Media’s digital media evangelist. His new book–”The Digital Photography Companion“–garnered a rave review from Rick Smolan, creator of “Blue Planet Run” and “America at Home.”
“Derrick Story has a unique gift for creating order out of chaos. Digital photography turns things upside down and even seasoned shooters need help,” says Smolan. “Whether you are a complete beginner or a photographer with experience, Derrick is the go-to guy. His new book “The Digital Photography Companion” fits perfectly into my camera bag and is going with me on all my assignments from now on.”
Derrick’s new book is small enough to stash in your camera bag or even a large back pocket. In fact, click here to see Derrick’s new book in his pocket!
Not too long ago, I got a chance to talk to Derrick about his new book.
Q. What made you write “The Digital Photography Companion?”
It’s little brother, “Digital Photography Pocket Guide,” had been successful over the years, but I wanted to do something more than just revise it for a 4th Edition. Digital photography has so many neat things to discuss these days, I felt like I needed a new book to cover them all properly (yet sized to still fit in your camera bag). So we went back to the drawing board and built this new book from the ground up. It turned out beautifully… even better than I had hoped.
We managed to catch some footage of senior editor, author, and blogger, Andy Oram at the Jolt Award ceremony last week. The host of the ceremony was writer Robert X. Cringely with Amber Ankerholz of Think-Services assisting in presenting the awards. Here’s the clip, if you’d like to share in our moment of glory.
Other business–win a free book
Michael R. Bernstein wrote to let me know that I had neglected to announce the winner of the free copy of Ajax: The Definitive Guide that I offered in my post What’s in a Definitive Guide?” This was quite a coincidence (assuming you believe in coincidence) because Michael, himself, was the winner we arbitrarily chose. Congratulations, Michael and thank you for posting your insightful comments.
For the next book contest, I’m giving away a copy of the Jolt Award winning Beautiful Code. Just post a comment about the subject: what makes code beautiful to you? What makes it ugly? Can code be beautiful? Write whatever you like on the subject, post your comment before Friday, March 21, and I will arbitrarily select a winner from the posts. The odds of winning are great—just ask Michael!
This Thursday, March 13, is your chance to attend the largest Python community conference ever–PyCon 2008–kicking off at the Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare Hotel. The event is unique in that it’s organized by the Python Software Foundation and is staffed entirely by volunteers; local user groups compete each year to host the conference in their cities.
The increased popularity of this year’s event reflects the steady growth in Python interest and usage that we’ve noted here at O’Reilly. As staunch community supporters, O’Reilly will be on the scene. You can stop by our booth and say hello to user group manager Marsee Henon in person. You won’t find her in the expo hall; rather the O’Reilly booth is out front near the registration desk (tell her Kathryn sent you).
That’s the theme of the upcoming OpenWeb Vancouver 2007 Conference, to be held in beautiful Burrard Inlet between Gastown and downtown Vancouver.
As the website declares:
The goal of the OpenWeb Vancouver 2007 Conference is to showcase open web technologies, communities and culture, and to discuss related issues with developers, designers, organizers and the community at large.
For the third year running, geeks and open web technologists along will invade Vancouver, BC April 14-15th, learning from innumerable sessions on PHP, Python, Ruby on Rails, XUL, Linux, Django and Drupal.
See the conference’s website for more information and to register, and check out their Facebook Event Page to see who else will be attending.
Each year, the Jolt Product Excellence Awards are presented to companies whose products have “jolted” the industry by making the task of creating software faster, easier, and more efficient. Dr. Dobb’s Journal presented this year’s awards last week at the 18th Annual Jolt Awards at SD West in Santa Clara.
One Jolt Award—the top prize—and three Productivity Awards are given in each of sixteen, categories, including books, project management tools, development environments, and collaboration tools, among others. Competition was steep this year, so we’re especially proud of the recognition we received. The winners were…
Accepting the beautiful, lucite-encased, Blue Raspberry Jolt Energy Drinks (a first-ever variance from the classic Jolt Cola for the awards), was Andy Oram, senior editor and O’Reilly Radar blogger (photo below). All-in-all, it was a good evening for O’Reilly.
Andy Oram accepting the Jolt Award for Beautiful Code. Presenting the awards were Amber Ankerholz of Think-Services and host Robert X. Cringely.
The 3rd Annual .NET Code Camp is coming up. This free, day-long event is put on by the local .NET community to help promote software development, expose attendees to best practices and provide access to content experts. Code Camp is designed as a series of intensive code-related demos and technical sessions to guide the developer to the next skill level. Code Camps have been taking place all over the country with the goal of providing a developer-to-developer learning experience that is fun and technically stimulating.
I was pleased to see that Broughton emphasized many areas that might be ignored by the casual editor, but that are necessary for improving the encyclopedia. For example, the book devotes its entire second chapter to reliable sources and citations, oft overlooked by new editors, but essential to writing a quality article.
What does the book provide besides what’s already on Wikipedia? While most of the information within Wikipedia: The Missing Manual is already on Wikipedia, the book’s tight-knit organization is what really makes it stand out from online help. The book can be used as a reference book for certain tasks, but can also be read as a step-by-step tutorial, walking through the various issues one might experience while editing Wikipedia.
So, is this book worth buying? If you’re a new editor, I think the well-organized information, combined with numerous examples, is an invaluable resource. For others, the book’s utility will depend on how experienced you are.
And thank you to everyone who searched for the O’Reilly books on the Adobe AIR poster. APC wins an O’Reilly book of his choice for his comment: Others have correctly attributed the covers of the two books in the poster. So let me be the first to point out that the Apollo and AIR books are Pocket Guides in the real world but are clearly Definitive Guide size in the poster :D
Today’s Press Democrat features O’Reilly Media’s Emerging Technology Conference in San Diego. In reporter Nathan Halverson’s story, conference speaker Saul Griffith, “an inventor who recently received a coveted MacArthur Fellowship and is co-founder of the website www.instructables.com,” discusses his efforts to reduce his carbon footprint. Writes Halverson:
Saul Griffith drives a hybrid car and thought he was practicing a sustainable lifestyle at his home in San Francisco.
But then he decided to calculate his carbon footprint, a measurement of greenhouse gases generated to support his lifestyle.
He was distraught to discover how unsustainable his life was.
“I was shocked,” said Griffith, an inventor who recently received a coveted MacArthur Fellowship and is co-founder of the Web site www.instructables.com.
Technology can play a critical role in helping Americans understand the challenges posed by global warming and help them make changes to reduce its threat, Griffith told several hundred people Tuesday at the annual Emerging Technology Conference organized by Sebastopol publisher O’Reilly Media.
The three-day conference is intended to bring together pre-eminent scientists from many disciplines and let them share the latest technology and ideas from their fields. On Tuesday, many of them addressed climate change and what needed to be done to create a sustainable global economy.
Griffith calculated his energy consumption in kilowatts, and included everything from his share of the federal government’s power usage to the amount of energy required to make the bottle of water he drank for breakfast.
“If I drink one bottle of water, it contributes about 4 percent of my allowable energy use a day,” he said.
Read the story here. (Free login required). Check here for more ETech news.
Photo by Kent Porter
Saul Griffith, right, talks with O’Reilly Media’s Dale Dougherty
Last night, O’Reilly Media launched Essential Silverlight 2 Up-to-Date to a crowd of 50-plus VIPs (and a few party crashers) at MIX08. Attendees included Microsoft’s Scott Hanselman, Thomas Lewis, Chris Bowen, and Miguel de Icaza of Novell. (None of the aforementioned were party-crashers, btw.)
O’Reilly editors John Osborn and Laurel Ruma were on hand to explain what makes the new book a different kind of animal. If you don’t know, you can visit the book’s forum for more details.
The Adobe AIR poster that Sara spoke about last week turned up in India at a User Group event focusing on Flex 3/AIR 1.
With about 60 user group members in attendance, Uday made a presentation about FLEX and AIR. The newly founded group, the Chennai ColdFusion User Group, was excited to see so many in attendance and hope to continue a great number of attendees in the future.
To see more pictures of the event, visit the group’s Picasa Web Album.
Robert Silvers, the editor of the New York Review of Books, joins host Ramona Koval of ABC Radio National’s The Book Show to discuss the phenomenon of the online encyclopedia, which is the subject of Wikipedia: The Missing Manual by John Broughton. “Some fascinating bits of information emerge, for example, more people use Wikipedia than use Amazon or eBay, and its usage is up there with MySpace, Facebook and YouTube. “Listen to the interview here.
If you missed out on the recent O’Reilly webinar, Writing LINQ Queries with LINQPad, you can still learn the ins-and-outs of using LINQPad directly from author Joseph Albahari. LINQPad is the querying tool that’s sweeping the .NET world. This is a must-view webinar for anyone working in C# 3.0 and Framework 3.5.
Download and watch the webinar video (43 minutes, .mov file, 50 MB) here.
You can also join authors Joseph and Ben Albahari in our C# 3.0 in a Nutshell Forum to continue the conversation.
Recent posts include:
Table Of Contents In Pdf
Linqpad Customization
Linqpad Open Source?
Sql Optimization
Intellisense
Linqpad Case Sensitivity
Join the discussion!
We’d love to hear your ideas about future webinars with O’Reilly authors. Which authors would you like to hear from and which subjects would you find most valuable? Please post a comment to let us know.
If you’re going to SD West this week, be sure to carve out an hour on Monday evening between 5:30 and 6:30 to catch the panel on Beautiful Code. Elliotte Rusty Harold, Michael Feathers, Alberto Savoia, and Christopher Seiwald (all contributors to the Beautiful Code book) will talk about the aesthetics of code: what makes code beautiful, and why–or even whether–beautiful code is important. This discussion is an ideal way to start your week in the proper frame of mind.
Be sure to stop by the O’Reilly booth (#407) in the expo hall, too, and say hello to all your favorite members of the O’Reilly team.
If you missed out on the Carla Schroder’s recent presentation, Control a World of Computers from Your Linux PC, you’re in luck. You can download and watch the webinar video (approx. 30 minutes, .mov file, 125 MB) here.
A couple weeks ago I asked people to post a comment to this blog telling me what they considered to be beautiful code—if anything—or to offer any other thoughts on the subject. I said that I would pick one winner from among those who commented, in a totally arbitrary fashion, to receive a free copy of the book, 
Apple or Microsoft. And if today you were transported inside the hallways of these company’s project teams, you’d be hard-pressed to guess where you were — everywhere you’d see young, casual, passionate people, having fun while working hard as they develop technological solutions to all the world’s problems.”
Derrick’s new book is small enough to stash in your camera bag or even a large back pocket. In fact, click 
This Thursday, March 13, is your chance to attend the largest Python community conference ever–
Each year, the 
Last night, O’Reilly Media launched 
With about 60 user group members in attendance, 
Recent posts include:
If you’re going to SD West this week, be sure to carve out an hour on Monday evening between 5:30 and 6:30 to catch 
Atom 1.0
