July 20, 1969: One Small Step … One Giant Leap …
http://www.wired.com/thisdayintech/2009/07/dayintech_0720
biffsocko.com is a huge fan of the crew of Apollo 11 and NASA in general. For related posts:
http://www.biffsocko.com/2010/05/14/neil-armstrong-kicking-ass/
The National Journal Online has an article Millennials Defined By Technology Use which states:
Millennials are at the leading edge of [technology],” said Tom Rosenstiel, director of Pew’s Project for Excellence in Journalism and moderator of a panel on media and information.
Some 24 percent of Millennials say technology use makes their generation unique, far more than the 11 percent who identified music and pop culture.
yet NPR in an article titled Cyberwarrior Shortage Threatens U.S. Security states
U.S. security officials say the country’s cyberdefenses are not up to the challenge. In part, it’s due to a severe shortage of computer security specialists and engineers with the skills and knowledge necessary to do battle against would-be adversaries.
This leads to a stunning realization that most Americans won’t admit; that there is a huge difference between being a consumer of technology and understanding how it’s built. For instance, everyone knows how to use a DVD player, but few people know how a DVD player actually works and can build them.
The Cassini Equinox Mission is a NASA four-year mission to explore the Saturn System via the Cassini spacecraft. There is a terrific article in the Boston.com website highlighting some of the images sent back.
I’ve been reading A Jim Butcher book called “Turn Coat“, It’s good. I’ve recently been turned on to his series of books called the “The Dresden Files“, about a Wizard PI in Chiago; and though I’ve been reading them out of order, I’ve been enjoying the journey into the fantastic. I generally don’t go for books that fall under the fantasy catagory, but I think that these are exceptionally fun.
My favorite superhero is Cliff Stoll Check him out on TED: Clifford Stoll on Everything and he’s written one of my favorite books: The Cukoo’s Egg (check out Stalking the Wiley Hacker)
The Custer Observatory is home of the largest telescope on Long Island. Since it’s open to the public every Saturday night, I had the oportunity to gaze at the stars through it last weekend. It was a beautiful stary night and I look forward to going back again.
Evaluate / Install / Document SMS Messaging software. This semester I’ll be working with Kannel and RapidSMS in the context of Ushahidi. It should be rather interesting. My kickoff is tomorrow afternoon. My wife will be away for a few days so it should give me a chance to get the project well underway. I’ll report progress back here on that matter.
Wow, this was a tough semester. I had a really hard time getting into the work this time around. The topics were interesting, but I have to admit to feeling a little burned out. Just a few more classes before I finish though.
In class this semester we did a lot of work with XML and web services (UDDI, WSDL, SOAP)
well, it was that time again. BiffSocko.com was about to expire and it was time to renew the domain name. We’re safe for another few years!
