I use Ubuntu like dancing bear; The magic in that is this: its not that the bear dances so beautifully, but that the bear dances at all.

So here's my Dancing Bear recipe for configuring Xampp to start up automatically for Ubuntu 9.10.

The first thing you need to know: There is something wrong with the directions the show for doing this in the Xampp FAQs. This isn't really anyone's fault. But the commands they offer for finding out crucial data aren't right. So don't freak out.

You really only need to know three basic things to set this up. Four if you count one of my excuses as a thing you need to know.

1. You need to know how to list and look at directories from the command line.
2. You need to know what runlevel the root user works at.
3. You need to know what a symbolic link is.
4. You need to not care about not having your machine log in automatically.

So lets get to it:

1. I'm not going to go over this. Even a dancing bear can type cd and ls to change directories and list them. That is, I think, the minimum required to call oneself a dancing bear.

2. The root user in Ubuntu works in Run Level 2.
How do I know this? Because if I change to Super User, by entering the terminal command "sudo su" I can type "runlevel" from the root-level command line. This tells me I'm running at "N 2." This is important, because it means that you have to put your symbolic links to the lammp launch script into /etc/rc2.d/

3.Go then. Make some symbolic links. But before you do, know this: You're making symbolic links to /opt/lampp/lampp in the /etc/rc2.d/ directory. You are going to give these symbolic links special names that will tell the system, when it's booting or shutting down, whether to call /opt/lampp/lampp in the context of starting xampp, or stopping xampp. If the symbolic links name starts with an S, that means, call it in the context of "start" when the symbolic link starts with a K, that means call the script int he context of "kill."
So what you need to do is create two symbolic links to /opt/lampp/lampp. I do this by changing to the /etc/rc2.d/ directory, and then using these commands:

• sudo ln -s /opt/lampp/lampp S99lampp
• sudo ln -s /opt/lampp/lampp k01lampp

What should happen then is that two little symbolic links will appear in the /etc/rc2.d/ directory. Those links are what tell the system to run the lampp start up script when the system is starting. You should also run "sudo update-rc.d lampp defaults" from the command line, but I don't know why or if it really matters. Remember, its not that the bear dances beautifully.

4. Finally, and here's something you'll just need to suck it up and get over: The way my system works, the machine does not enter Run Level 2 until you've logged into the system. That means, since my whole goal was to make the lampp server start without my intervention, I enabled the Ubuntu desktop system to automatically log me in. Problem solved. Unless you really don't care about security don't run your system that way, it's stupid. One day you will get burned.

So, I was toolin' around in my Flickr site looking for an image to use for some wacky dumb project and I stumbled across the stupidest video ever.

It's a video of the Little Black Dog (tm) flapping her legs in the sunshine. But what's going on the image is not what makes this video warm my heart on a long cold day in early march. What warms my heart is the soundtrack.

Two-year-old Gaia, clearly sitting in a pool of water, is asking me to identify a bucket. And it is so important that she asks me five times.

Gaia: Is this the bucket daddy?
Is this the bucket daddy?
Is this the bucket daddy?
Is this the bucket daddy?
Is this the bucket dad?

Gabe: Yeah. That's a bucket.

Gaia: Why?
Why's that a bucket?

This is what the flip video was invented for people. It's also why I keep all my raw flip footage, even though there is more of it than I'll ever be able to parse. You never know what is the golden footage that will warm your heart when you need it most. Data storage is cheap and plentiful in this day and age. Roll with it, people.

I don't Tumble anymore, but I have friends who do. And their feeds are the only thing you really need to read on the whole wide Internet. I used this post at work today to emphasize that, in spite of all of our frustrations, I feel like our work in addressing the stigma issues that affect mental health is really making a difference.
"Let's treat every disease like depression" may well be the magnum opus of the millennials. They don't get much, but one thing they do really understand is that emotional states are real things.
My only wish is that the author of "Treat every disease" had offered her work under a creative commons license so I could properly share it with you here.

I agree with many of the things listed in Consumerist article about things you should do before and after your laptop is stolen. But there are some suggestions that are not only dumb, but just plain foolish.

Everyone should have backups and serial numbers of their gadgets on file. They should, if possible, have original purchase receipts stashed away somewhere. I'll even give credence to the value of having a lo-jack type software product on your machine, in spite of my personal misgivings about them with regards to privacy.

But many of the Consumerist's suggestions for what to do after your laptop is stolen seem more about vigilantism than about getting your stuff back. That's kind of silly. You might have your priorities mixed up if you're willing to install theft reporting software on your laptop but don't carry renter's insurance.

It's not really the Consumerist's fault. News Media particularly likes to laud vigilantes as heroes. And, in a way, they're right. There is something heroic about the Joe Workaday guy who stands up to injustice and fights for what's right. But here's the thing: To paraphrase Zoe Washburne: A hero is someone who gets people killed.

Before you take a walk into the seedy pawn shop in your neighborhood all hell bent on getting your laptop back, ask yourself if your laptop is worth being killed over. When you see news stories of hipsters chasing down iPhone thieves via the GPS unit mounted on their fixies, remember that these people are putting themselves in a perilous confrontation with a person who, by definition, already has at least a marginally questionable moral compass. A person willing to steal from you might well be willing to shoot you when you call them on it.

When my Macintosh Powerbook 145b was stolen from my 48th Street home in 1998, I went down to the local pawn shop and asked about it. They sent someone from the back up to talk to me, and she, seeing my glare and the twitch in my face (and certainly sensing my angry vibe) showed me one or two laptops and then asked me to leave. *I am so glad I did.*

Is your iPhone worth depriving your mother of ever seeing you again? Is your laptop more important to you than seeing your children grow up?

I'm not saying that you should just lay back and let the criminals win, I'm saying that you need not get so caught up in your feelings of loss, injustice and victimization that you lose sight of the bigger picture. You're more important to the world than your gadgets. Never lose sight of that.

Revoking Jenifer's right to complain about my musical selections: Exhibit A

The first in a series.

Piggybacking on a previous post about War Driving: This is great. Listen to the caller try to get Leo to justify her belief that she's rightly using her neighbor's wifi access point for over the past year.

I don't agree with everything Leo says in response to her, but I am really amazed at the caller's sense of self-righteousness.

I like this comment on Read-Write-Web.

400 million people now use Facebook, and they don't all have CS Master's degrees from Stanford. But if you work in the IT/tech/Internet/online media industries, they do manage to pay your bills. They're the ones who open emails, click ads, make purchases, sign up for subscriptions and generally take the majority of actions that make our whole ecosystem work.

And most of them have no idea what a web browser is or how it differs from a search engine or a social network. They've chosen to be smart about other things, like building cars or making art or raising families. I'll bet some of them are terrific dancers. We have to build the Web for them, too.

This pretty much sums up how I feel about Web414's future. Web414 is for the people who are working together to make The New Web(tm). It can't be monitized or productized. It's about people who want to build cars, make art, raise families and dance in new ways using the web as a platform.

Who is Web414 for? It's for me. Its for you. Its for the community. Its for who we are who chose to be part of Web414. Web414 is the music makers, and it is the dreamers of dreams. Don't spoil it by making it into just another pointless meetup. Web414 is the magic store. Web414's like a movie, write your own ending... keep believing, keep pretending ... We've done just what we set out to do, Thanks to the lovers, the dreamers, and you.

Web414 must remain dedicated to being more than the sum of its parts. Web414 must be a place where we are free to follow our passions and are unencumbered by "making it work." Web414 works because it does. It is a group of people in a single place making great creative things happen on, for, and about the Web.

Does anyone wardrive anymore?
Anyway, with the disaperance of regularly available free-and-open wifi, I've had to rely more and more on known Wifi spots to slurp up my mail on my iPod when I'm on the road.

Sure, I could get a real smartphone. But I won't pay for a 3G data package. If I could get one of those fancy $14.95 a month plans for my iPod touch, I'd think about it, maybe. But that day's a long way off. So I wardrive.

Terminator fans will appreciate that last night, on my way home, I spotted SkyNet on Capital Drive in Brookfield.

Sadly, the only wardriving app I've seen out of the three-billion tip calculators on the itunes store is a $2.99 app. Which is $2.99 more than I'm willing to pay for any app.

I usually have a almost obsessive urge to download app updates as soon as I see them.
I guess I'll pass on this "update." Praise Stansa for at least being honest about it.

Mother teases as the seasons creep.

Mother teases as the seasons creep.
She knows what she wants, and she can’t help but give glimpses
of the fires that bellow below her crusted coverings.

Ragged tufts of green poke between the crusts and cracks.
A bountiful bust of blossoms stands between the stations.

Can the turning of seasons come so closely to the deeps of winter’s despair?

That is not ours to say.
But it is ours to hope.
 
We hope
and hope
and hope some more.

Life waits between the peaks and valleys. Fire strikes at the midpoint, snuffing desolation with its bawdy smolder. Its flames belch dance and song, bread and wine.

It is springtime, and it comes again.

Feb. 2, 2010 \ Read it on Scribd \ Photo attribution