Opera 7 beta

Opera 7 Beta is out. It sports a new look, which one tires of quite soon. But it’s as fast as ever, and has better standards compliance. via Anand

Windows XP simulation

Omar Zabir’s portal. Let’s you use Windows XP without having Windows XP. Well, actually, it’s just a tour of Windows XP features, but you pretty much get to “use” XP. Quite a piece of programming! via MetaFilter Comments desi yazzie 6 Sep 2006 3:48 am: Good, wonderful, and would like to use it to troubleshoot S Anand 6 Sep 2006 4:05 pm: I wonder if it has any deep XP functionality, though…

Google PageRank

On figuring Google’s pagerank. It’s interesting to note that Google, and only Google, ranks 11 out of 10 in its pagerank.

McKinsey blocks competitors

An interesting thread on Andersja’s about how McKinsey is blocking competitors from its site. I’m at the receiving end of it. And so far, it hasn’t affected my life in any way.

Paradox of randomness

Another interesting piece related to complexity: a speech on the paradox of randomness by Gregory Chaitin. via missing matter

Distributed proofreaders

Distributed Proofreaders. As the name suggests, it’s a distributed web-based tool for proof-reading books for Project Gutenberg. References from Slashdot and kuro5hin have spiked the number of pages proofread. But even that apart, they’re targetting over 1,000 pages a day. That’s over a book a day! via kuro5hin

Photoblogs and the Visual Thesaurus

Photoblogs and the Visual Thesaurus via Kribs

Quantum information science

Quantum information science: a convergence of complexity theory and quantum mechanics. via missing matter

Prime factorisation algorithm

An update on the IIT-K prime factorisation algorithm. via Matthai Markose

Distributed computing grows

Oh, so Sam Palmisano made CEO of IBM. Guess that was expected. He wants to focus on on-demand computing (his word for corporatising distributed computing projects). Shortly, there will be companies creating this [distributed computing] market – focusing on aggregating the retail computing power, and using them across several projects. (Google is already trying to do that through its toolbar, and so is Intel.) – S Anand, 29 Sep 2002 And now, IBM. I was prophetic :-)

Google glossary bombing

After Googlebombing, now we have Google glossary bombing. via Metafilter

No more updates for a while

I’m going to try and not update until Monday (11th Nov, not 4th). Don’t even bother visiting. Happy Diwali!

A taxonomy of bloggers

A taxonomy of bloggers by psychological profile.

Office 11 needs Windows 2000 or XP

Sorry. You have to buy Windows 2000 or XP to use Office 11. Microsoft’s next strategy to sell their operating systems. via Google News

Pride and Prejudice

Pride and Prejudice, from the director of Bend It Like Beckham. This doesn’t sound like a light entertainer the way Bend It Like Beckham was… via RobotWisdom

The Newspaper is dead

The Newspaper Today is dead. Yet another blow to the pay-model. via Netahoy

Touch people over the Internet

You can hear people over the Internet. You can see people over the Internet. Now you can touch people over the Internet. When can we smell and taste them? Or are these senses too mundane to worry about? I, for one, would be very happy to be able to taste recipes online. via Ravikiran

Blogspamming

Blogspamming: the new phenomenon. It works only if you have a referral log, and look at it. Unfortunately for me, thanks to my crazy domain hosting service, I am blogspam-immune. via kuro5hin

Dumbledore dead

I didn’t know that Richard Harris was Dumbledore. Pity. He’s no more. “He did threaten to kill me if I recast (Professor Dumbledore). I cannot even repeat what he said. He still has got that fight inside of him,” Columbus said. Now, does that mean that he’s already finished his role in the sequel?

Photographs by stereotypes

Eric Myer’s stereotypes. Photographs where you can combine the top and bottom halves of 20 faces. It’s incredible how realistic the final combinations look. via Blogdex