Thoughts

American airport hysteria

I love this article from Patrick Smith at Salon.com. It’s on the subject of American hysteria when it comes to airport security, and it references all of the overblown and recent responses of the TSA and other individuals charged with security at American airports. Since when have we become such a nation of frightened ninnies?

“This country needs to get a grip. We need a slap in the face, a splash of cold water.”

“What caused the delays and what hassled so many travelers was not the defendant’s actions, but our mindless and hysterical response to them.”

“Here in this proclaimed new “age of terrorism,” we act as if the clock began ticking on Sept. 11, 2001. In truth we’ve been dealing with this stuff for decades. Not only in the 1980s, but throughout the ’60s and ’70s as well. Acts of piracy and sabotage are far fewer today.”

“Imagine the Karachi attack happening tomorrow. Imagine TWA 847 happening tomorrow. Imagine six successful terror attacks against commercial aviation in a five-year span. The airline industry would be paralyzed, the populace frozen in abject fear. It would be a catastrophe of epic proportion — of wall-to-wall coverage and, dare I suggest, the summary surrender of important civil liberties.”

“What is it about us, as a nation, that has made us so unable to remember, and unable to cope?”

Patrick isn’t the only one upset about this. I wrote about our overblown airport security rules in the past — see this article, and this one, and this as well.

All I can say is that hope can be glimpsed across the pond, in Europe. Having flown through multiple European airports this past year, I can tell you things appear more rational there. Even when there are extra security checks, the tone is calm, the demeanor is calm, and you’re not eyed with suspicious eyes, like you are here in the US, where everything is seen as a threat.

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How To

Are you really backing up your WP blog?

When those of us with self-hosted WordPress blogs back up our content using the built-in WXR functionality, do we ever check the downloaded XML file? Until recently, I didn’t worry about it. I’d click on the Export button, copy the WXR file to a backup folder and think my blog was safe, but I was wrong.

You see, what may be happening is the creation of the WXR file on the server side may be terminated before all the content gets written to it, and we’ll end up with a partial backup of our blogs. This is no fault of the WordPress platform, but will happen when the server settings don’t allow enough resources to the PHP script which writes out the XML file. When that’s the case, this is what the end of the WXR XML file looks like.

In the screenshot you see above, the script ran out of memory (I’d set PHP’s memory_limit at 64 MB, which was too little for my needs), but it can also run out of time, if PHP’s max_execution_time is set too low.

Depending on your scenario, you may or may not have access to the original php.ini file on your web server. If not, check with your host, you may be able to create a php.ini at the root of your hosting account to adjust these parameters (within limits). The thing to do is set the memory_limit and the max_execution_time high enough to allow PHP enough resources to generate the full WXR file. I can’t prescribe any specific limits here, because the amount of memory and time the script needs depends on how big your blog is. All I can suggest is that you experiment with the settings until they’re high enough for the WXR file to generate fully. You don’t want to set them too high, because your server will run out of memory, and that’s not fun either. This is what my setup looks like.

What happens if you use a cheap web host is that you’ll get crammed along with hundreds of other sites on a single virtual server where all the settings are tightly reined in, to make sure no one’s hogging any resources. Chances are that as your blog grows, your WXR file will get too big and will need more resources than are available to write itself, which means you’ll start getting truncated backup files. If you never check them by opening up the XML and scrolling to the end to rule out any error messages, you’re not really backing up your blog.

Keep this in mind if you want to play it safe. Always check the WXR file. A good backup should close all the tags at the end, particularly the tag, like this screenshot shows.

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Thoughts

1978 ad for Hagoromo Foods, spoofing Star Wars

1978 ad for Hagoromo Foods, spoofing Star Wars. Goofy, silly, weird and fun. Looks to be an ad for what they call “sea chicken“, which I’m guessing is tuna.

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Reviews

Camera preview: Nikon CoolPix S570

The Nikon CoolPix S570 digital camera is small — just about the same size as the Canon PowerShot SD780 IS camera — so it invites a comparative look. I looked at it side-by-side with the SD780 recently, and here’s what I think.

The design is good, but not as good as that of the SD780. I like the beveled lines and the metal accents, including the protruding camera strap anchor, but I think the CoolPix logo is badly placed, and ruins the clean look of the camera. Think about it, would you want your brand logo to be smaller than the line logo? It makes no sense, yet that’s what Nikon’s done. They’ve emphasized CoolPix over the trustworthy Nikon name. Canon hasn’t made this mistake. Have a look at the SD780 IS and you’ll see they know how to do this right. Another thing that bugs me is the annoying font chosen for CoolPix. Nikon, please, if you’re going to keep using CoolPix as a line name, then please use a decent font or at least make the writing smaller.

When it comes to features, there are more of them overall than on the Canon SD780 IS, but right off the bat, one can see the S570 lacks HD video capabilities. That may or may not be an important criteria for you, depending on your needs. The S70 certainly offers other wonderful selling points, such as a 5x Zoom and a very nice maximum aperture of f/2.7, not to mention that the price is about $50-75 less than that of the Canon SD780 IS.

  • 12.0 megapixels resolution
  • Ultra Thin and Compact
  • 5x Nikkor Zoom Lens
  • Bright, 2.7″ LCD
  • Scene Auto Selector
  • Smart Portrait System with Advanced Face-Priority Technology, Smile Timer, Blink Proof function, Blink Warning, Active D-lighting and the new Skin Softening function
  • 4-way Image Stabilization with Vibration Reduction, Motion Detection, High ISO (up to 3200) and Best Shot Selector
  • Quick Retouch
  • Standard Definition video recording (640 x 480 @ 30 fps)

Other differences between this camera and the Canon SD780 IS include:

  • The new Skin Softening functionality, which offers three levels of in-camera smoothing, allowing you to diminish age lines or imperfections from your subjects’ faces right in the camera
  • Lack of optical image stabilization, which is compensated by the presence of electronic Vibration Reduction and Best Shot Selector (the SD780 includes the equivalent of Motion Detection and also goes to 3200 ISO)
  • Wider field of view (28 mm equivalent vs. 33 mm equivalent on the SD780 IS)

The Nikon CoolPix S570 digital camera can be purchased from Amazon or B&H Photo.

Photos used courtesy of Nikon.

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Reviews

Camera preview: Canon PowerShot SD780 IS

I had the chance to look at the Canon PowerShot SD780 IS Digital Elph camera recently, and was impressed by the beauty of its design, its diminutive size, and its features. This camera is truly small. Being used to holding DSLRs, holding this camera in my hand was an unusual experience for me. It’s so small, I thought I might drop it or break its buttons when I pressed them. But that’s just an initial illusion. It works fine, it’s sturdy, and its matte, non-slip finish means you won’t easily drop, unless you’re Mr. Butterfingers.

I’ve always liked Canon’s Elph line. I owned their 1st gen Elph camera, which recorded images to APS film, and I still have it, though I don’t use it any more. What I like about this camera is how the Elph legacy, combined with modern technology and design cues, all comes together to create a truly wonderful little camera. This camera is a stunner. The logo, the lettering, the buttons, the lens and all of its other building blocks form a beautiful whole where everything falls into place.

And how could I not be impressed by its features as well?

  • 12.1 Megapixel Resolution
  • 3x Optical Zoom Lens
  • Optical Image Stabilizer Technology
  • DIGIC 4 Processor with iSAPS scene-recognition technology
  • Face Detection Technology
  • Face Self-Timer
  • Advanced Red-eye Correction
  • Intelligent Contrast Correction
  • High ISO Sensitivity (up to 3200 ISO)
  • HD Video Recording (1280 x 720 @ 30 fps) with HD output through mini-HDMI connector
  • 20 Shooting Modes and My Colors Photo Effects
  • Smart Auto Mode
  • High-Resolution 2.5″ PureColor II LCD

The only things that bothered me somewhat were the 3x Zoom and the maximum f/3.3 aperture. While the 3x zoom has been standard on the Elph cameras from the start, I’d like to see a 5x zoom already. It would be a helpful feature for many situations. The aperture could also be f/2.8 or who knows, maybe even f/2.2 or f/2.0. I realize the physics of it might get tricky given the camera’s diminutive size, but I’d like to challenge the Canon engineers to do it. It would help greatly in low light conditions, and would add extra bokeh to portraits and macro photographs.

I’d have loved to test out the camera’s HD video feature, as I’ve been looking for a small HD camera, but I didn’t get the chance. At any rate, I was very impressed to see a camera of that size offer HD video. That in itself is an achievement, given that it’s already got a ton of other circuitry crammed in that very limited space. Ideally, one hopes the quality of the HD video is good, without banding or compression artifacts, like that of the HD video from other digital cameras. If anyone’s used this feature on the SD780, please do let me know how good it is.

The SD780 IS comes with all the accessories you see above. You can get a good idea of how small this camera really is by having a look at the charger for its battery, which is a good deal longer and thicker than the camera itself.

The Canon PowerShot SD780 IS is available for purchase from B&H Photo and Amazon. (Amazon is currently selling it for $199, which is a pretty good deal.)

Photos used courtesy of Canon.

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