If MIT wasn’t already a totally awesome school (which it is), then it definitely is now. Faculty at MIT have now voted that any publications that they receive should and will be open access.

From Ars Technica:

If there were any doubt that open access publishing was setting off a bit of a power struggle, a decision made last week by the MIT faculty should put it to rest. Although most commercial academic publishers require that the authors of the works they publish sign all copyrights over to the journal, Congress recently mandated that all researchers funded by the National Institutes of Health retain the right to freely distribute their works one year after publication (several foundations have similar requirements). Since then, some publishers started fighting the trend, and a few members of Congress are reconsidering the mandate. Now, in a move that will undoubtedly redraw the battle lines, the faculty of MIT have unanimously voted to make any publications they produce open access.

It is no secret that I am a huge supporter of open source software. Furthermore, I am also a huge supporter of open access publications.

I have argued in the past, that I believe that there is no reason why research publications, which are the key to scientific progress, should be withheld from anyone (the “anyone” being the people that cannot afford to purchase memberships to various journals etc.). One argument against the Open Access policy is that the cost for publishers to maintain a website, host articles, paper costs, etc., would somehow need to be covered.

I think to a certain extent, this is true. Clearly, it will cost publishers money to do all of the things mentioned above. However, with all of the money the government spends on research, it at least seems plausible that they could give a grant to an organization that could host PDF versions of the papers, and offer them for free. Maybe we could even create some new jobs in this process. Maybe publishers could be given a certain amount of government funding for the more “open” that they are. Publishers could still charge whatever they want for physical copies of the paper, and even for the PDF’s if they so choose, but everyone would have access to this free site. (Note: I realize that a potential counter argument is that there could still be people out there that would not have access to the free PDF’s [people that cannot afford computers]. However, I think in this day and age, this argument becomes weaker and weaker now that more libraries offer free internet access. Further more, this counter argument seems like it would also go against proprietary publications.)

I think the biggest problem with my above argument is that it requires only the U.S. government to do something. Everyone should be accountable for providing free access to publications, not just the U.S. All nations should work together to provide open access for the sciences.

jonnale Open Source MIT, Open Access, research

I really like puzzles. Although I do enjoy board game puzzles, my favorite type of puzzles are ones that require extensive thinking and a clever and elegant solution. This is what really drew me to Computer Science. Applying data structures, algorithms, architecture, etc., and coming up with a high performing, elegant solution to a problem is challenging and exciting to me. Puzzles are also a reason I really like Philosophy.

On my algorithms midterm exam before Spring break, there was a question that I think represents why I truly enjoy studying Computer Science. Never in my life have I read a question on an exam and said to myself, “This question is awesome.” I am going to post a modified version of the question, and strongly encourage anyone to post their solution as a comment. I will post one possible solution on Friday.

A firm wants to determine the highest floor on its n-story building from which a device can fall with no impact on the device’s functionality. The firm has two identical gadgets that you can experiment with (each costs $1,000,000). You are allowed to break both gadgets,  but no extra gadgets will be provided. Design a brute force algorithm in the best efficiency class to solve this problem.

This is a very technical question, so in order to simplify it, do not worry about what “brute force” or “efficiency class” means if you have never taken an algorithms course. These are important concepts for solving this problem in a real life situation, but I do not want these topics to discourage discussion amongst non-CS readers. If you wish to leave a comment, simply write what you would do to solve this problem.

Example solution:

1. Drop gadget on first floor
2. If it breaks, gadget cannot be dropped from hight=current floor
3. If it does not break, go to next floor and Repeat.

Example in pseudocode:

DidItBreak(n)
//where n is the number of floors
for currentFloor<-1 to n do
  if result of device drop = broken
    return currentFloor-1
  else
    currentFloor <- currentFloor + 1
  return -1

jonnale Computer Science algorithms

!!!! Spoiler Alert !!!!

Dear writers of “Knowing”,

I just got back from watching your movie, and I am totally dumbfounded about what just happened.

The movie started off great. Actually, I was really surprised. Nicholas Cage played an Astrophysicist (I think?) professor at MIT, which is awesome. MIT is an incredible school, and the campus looks really cool. The topic Nicholas Cage was talking to his students about was the debate between Determinism and Randomness. Both MIT, and this debate are interesting to me, so needless to say, I was excited.

The majority of the movie was not bad. It was not great, but it was not bad. I did think Nicholas Cage figured out the pattern to the numbers a little too quickly, but after all, if he is playing a professor at MIT, you never know.

My biggest complaint is about the ending of the movie. It made NO sense! Why were there aliens in an icicle shaped space ship? Forget the spaceship, WHY were there aliens? The movie would have been much better if everyone had just died (or Nicholas Cage saved the day).

What I am really confused about is whether or not this movie is supposed to portray a Christian message. There were many Christian references: Nicholas Cage talking about heaven to his kid, the picture of Ezekiel, the Adam and Eve reference at the very end. However, what doesn’t make sense, again, is the aliens. If you were trying to send a Christian message, how do the aliens fit into the story? If anything, it shows that four aliens could be possible for our existence (if for some reason a solar flare was going to kill us all and we were picked up by an icicle shaped space ship and dropped on this planet).

If the point of this movie was supposed to answer the question about Determinism vs. Randomness, in favor of determinism, I think the entire alien part voids whatever message you were trying to get across. It was simply crazy.

I think you took a very interesting an idea, added some Christian symbolism, and then ruined the entire thing by adding aliens. I actually started laughing when I saw the spaceship. I said to myself, “This seriously cannot be happening.”

$22 dollars later (tickets for my girlfriend and I + pop corn + pop), I am disappointed, confused, and most importantly, curious as to why you would add aliens to this film.

Sincerely,

Jon

jonnale Rant

For the past few months, I have been using Mozilla Thunderbird as my e-mail client. Configuring, maintaining, and using Thunderbird has been a very easy and painless experience, and I am currently using it to keep track of my three e-mail addresses.

Since the start of the Spring ‘09 semester, I have been wanting to use a calendar application to help me stay organized and keep track of things I need to do. So today I downloaded Mozilla Lightning, a calendar extension that works with Thunderbird. The best part is, it also allows you to sync with Google Calendar! This is a great feature because it allows you to sync your calendar across multiple computers or mobile devices.

Linux Users (Pre-Installation):

Note: Linux users ONLY, before installing Lightning you need the libstdc++5 library. If you are running Ubuntu, run the following code:

sudo apt-get install libstdc++5

Installation:

1. Download the Mozilla Lightning extension: http://www.mozilla.org/projects/calendar/lightning/
2. In Thunderbird, go to Tools>Add-ons
3. Select the “Extensions” tab, and click install. A dialog will pop up, direct it to the extension file downloaded in step 1.
4. Restart Thunderbird.

Syncing with Google Calendar:

Install Google Provider Extension:

1. Download the Provider for Google Calendar extension: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/addon/4631
2. Follow Steps 2-3 from previous example, but in Step 3, make sure you select the new extension that you just downloaded.
3. Restart Thunderbird.

Get Calendar XML:

1. Login to your Google Calendar, and select “Calendar Settings” for the calendar you wish to use.
2. Go to where it says Private Address and click XML. (Note: you can use the public address if you have a public calendar, but since mine is private (and I want it to remain private), I am using private).
3. A prompt will come up displaying the URL for your private calendar. Copy this. YOU WILL NEED THIS FOR THE NEXT PART.

Sync Google Calendar with Lighting:

1. In Thunderbird, click the Calendar icon (on my theme, it is located underneath all my e-mail addresses). A “Calendar” tab should appear in the tool bar, select that and click “New Calendar”.
2. At the prompt, select “On the Network”.
3. At the next screen, select “Google Calendar”.
4. In the “Location” text box, paste in the Google XML code, copied from step 3 in the previous instructions.

DONE!

Now any changes you make on your web based Google Calendar will appear on your Lightning Calendar. Likewise, any changes you make in Lightning will also appear on your web based Google Calendar.

jonnale Uncategorized

One common argument against the use of Linux is that is usually requires the user to have to edit some file manually to get something to work. I never liked this argument because although this might be true (it very well may not be, depending on the user), the steps required to get programs to work are usually very well defined, and can be found on the Ubuntu Forums.

However, in terms of the desktop environment, it seems like Linux has many features that every day users find appealing:

For those that are not familiar with Linux, the above video shows people’s reactions to KDE 4, one of the various Desktop Environments available for Linux users. The users are unaware that they are seeing KDE 4 or Linux and believe it is the new version of Windows, Windows 7.

If you don’t like the looks or features of Windows 7 or KDE 4, Linux users have a variety of desktop environments. My favorite, and the one I currently use, is GNOME.

jonnale Open Source, Tech-stuff kde 4, linux, windows 7

The Department of Defense has created their own version of SourceForge.net, which hosts code for military projects. According to David Mihelcic, the chief technology officer for the Defense Information Systems Agency, Forge.mil is modeled off of SourceForge.net but with much greater security. Obviously, it is not open to everyone, and is only available to DoD personel, but this is a big step for the open source movement. If anything, it shows how valuable a tool open source development can be, even in mission critical situations.

jonnale Open Source

I finally found a gallery plugin that I really like. I am using NextGEN Gallery, which seems to be working great! I am very impressed with Wordpress.

jonnale Photography

Last month I bought a Samsung T220HD from newegg. My friend also got the same monitor but in the 25 inch version as a gift for Christmas.

After hooking it up, I immediately noticed that the top of the screen was darker than the bottom of the screen. Folders on the top of my screen were dull and dark, while the folders on the bottom of my screen were very bright and vivid. I played with the settings for over an hour, and was not able to fix the problem.

After noticing this, I called my friend and his monitor also suffered from the exact same symptoms. Someone else that I knew who also owned the monitor said his had similar problems, but it did not bother him that much.

My friend returned his monitor for a refund, and I sent mine back to newegg for a replacement. I just received the new monitor, and it also suffers from the brightness/darkness issue. It is so noticeable! The top of the screen is clearly darker than the bottom. Solid colors show a gradient if they are full screen.

I am not sure how this monitor is getting such great reviews. On most sites, it has 4 or 5 stars. However, if you google the name and the problem, you see many forum and blog posts complaining about the same issue.

I always thought that Samsung made high quality products, but they really dropped the ball on this one. I am returning mine for a full refund (thankfully, Newegg has excellent support).

jonnale Tech-stuff Samsung monitor, T220HD

Everyone that has a gmail account knows how awesome gmail is. The layout is great, there are a TON of features and options, and it comes with some awesome applications (Google Apps). Not to mention, you get 7gb of storage for FREE.

Recently, I found out that Google offers Google Apps (gmail, calander, google docs, etc) for FREE to educational institutions. Not only that, but Google maintains the server, and everything is stored on the Google cloud. This means that IT and server administrators do not have to worry about an e-mail server!

In terms of money:

1. Schools would not have to purchase a server for e-mail (or at least storage for e-mail).
2. Schools would not have to purchase a license to software (such as Microsoft Outlook Webmail)
3. Server administrators could work on more important tasks.

Of course money is important, but faculty and students should also be a big concern. Let’s compare Google Apps with the software my college uses, Microsoft Outlook Webmail:

Google Apps:

Gmail:

• 7GB of storage space
• Very user friendly
• Saves e-mail while you are typing in case of a crash
• Separate Section for “starred” e-mail (useful for bookmarking important e-mail)
• Allows you to search the content of your mail

Google Calendar

• Excellent user interface. (Seriously, anyone with a brain can figure it out in less than 10 seconds)
• Allows you to share calendars
  • You can make subcalendars, and only share the subcalendars while making your general calendar private (this would be great for faculty and students).
• Allows you to send invites for events. This could be very useful for department meetings and faculty, student groups, etc.

Google Docs:

(Note: I must admit, I do not use Google docs that frequently due to syncing notes with DropBox)

• Allows you to create text documents, presentations, spreadsheets, forms, etc.
• Allows you to share documents with your peers.
• Could be a great tool for taking notes in class.

Microsoft Outlook Webmail:

• “Premium” mode only works with internet explorer (sorry mac and linux users).
  • “Premium” mode really means drag and drop. (It’s 2009, is drag and drop really a “premium” feature?)
• E-mail
  • 50mb of space (I am currently using 46mb and receive a warning every day)
  • Does not save draft of e-mail while you are typing.
  • Times out after 10-15 minutes. If you write a 15 minute e-mail and hit “send” it will take you to the login screen and you will have lost the e-mail (this is so frustrating).
  • Allows you to “Flag” e-mail for bookmarking
  • DOES NOT LET YOU SEARCH YOUR INBOX (if it does, it isn’t mind numbingly obvious where the search option is)
• Calendar
  • Does not have a nice, simple graphical view.
  • Sending events to other people is no where near as simple (it is not that challenging, but compared to google calendar, it could be much simpler).
  • I am not even sure how to add a personal event? Here is the screen when you hit add event:

(click to expand)

(Note: I am assuming the first field is the “To:” field (why are none of the fields labeled?)? Why is it required? What if you want a personal event?)

• Notes – No where near as many features as google docs. To use an analogy: Google docs is to Open Office, as Microsoft Webmail “note” is to a simple .txt file.

The reason I did not include each feature in Microsoft Outlook Webmail as its own nice header like I did for Google Apps is because MO Webmail is just a mess of features, while each Google App is its own separate application (you can use Google docs without using gmail, etc).

So in conclusion:

1. Google Apps is Free!
2. Google Apps provides plenty of storage space (7gb).
3. Google Apps would save time and money (no need to buy server, Google maintains the cloud).
4. Google Apps offers more features, and each feature is well implemented. These features could be used by faculty, students, student groups, etc.

(I would just like to note, I use thunderbird as an e-mail client due to my strong dislike for Microsoft Outlook Webmail. I prefer using an e-mail client, but many students simply use the webmail client.)

jonnale Computer Science

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jonnale Uncategorized