‘ Personal ’ Category

books…

5 responses, Jun 11, 2010

2 days ago I saw a post on Matthew‘s blog about what books he is reading at the moment.

I was wondering if this too could become a Fedora meme? let’s try it!

These are the books I am currently reading:

Books laying around here that I still have to read:

who’s next?

Math isn’t hard, or is it?

1 response, Jun 10, 2010

Today, while I was browsing the web I encountered this piece of math:

       a = b
   a + a = a + b
      2a = a + b
 2a - 2b = a + b - 2b
2(a - b) = a + b - 2b
2(a - b) = a - b
       2 = 1

On first sight you might think it is correct, but if you look a little bit closer you can easily see the error!
let’s try it again:

       a = b            //true
   a + a = a + b        //true
      2a = a + b        //true
 2a - 2b = a + b - 2b   //true
2(a - b) = a + b - 2b   //true
2(a - b) = a - b        //true <=> 2a - 2b = a - b <=> a - b = a - b <=> 0 = 0
       2 = 1            //false (should be 0 = 0)

that’s it for my ranting =)

devops devops devops?

1 response, Jun 09, 2010

This was the opening of Devopsdays 2009. Quite a funny clip isn’t it? But what is a devop actually? Kris Buytaert is an expert on the subject, and I found a nice presentation of him explaining the concept:

DevOps is not about operators or developers, it is about how to get things done the right way. DevOps is also about how operators talk to developers, but is not about an operator who becomes a developer and visa versa.

A dev team that follows the DevOps principle, talks to the operators during the development of the applications. What do we need? What can we get? Doing you development on the same machines as the ones the production runs on, is always good. You find the bugs faster, you find other issues faster, and you end up with a better product, while you shorten the development time.

I’m already looking forward to the next devopsdqys in Europe. I just might join them to learn more, and share my own thoughts about the subject.

quiting school?

13 responses, Feb 16, 2010

arch, I don’t know…

I have one of those ‘I should quit school’ days.. And just today I saw a post on planet fedora from Mel Chua .
She is not alone one of the most awesome geek girls I know, but she also helped me out a couple of times already. (big thank you Mel!)

The title of her blogpost was ‘How to do stuff?‘. While I was reading the post I saw some very familiar things.. I C/P’ed some of her text (I hope she doesn’t mind):

In My Parents’ World – How to Do Stuff (answer: “Get A Job according to these Complex Procedures”)

  1. Be interested in something
  2. Study (very, very, very) hard
  3. Get (very, very, very) good grades
  4. Make a resume
  5. Buy suit
  6. Apply to jobs
  7. Get introduced to recruiter
  8. Get interviewed
  9. Get hired
  10. Do Stuff

Except that the “Do Stuff” might be… well, entry-level job, filing stuff, doing thankless gruntwork waiting ’till you could move up the ladder and really Do Stuff, you know…

In The FOSS World – How to Do Stuff (answer: “Do Stuff”)

  1. Be interested in something
  2. Do Stuff
  3. get hired

As she is already working,she must be one of people that know what they are talking about. right? So I told her on IRC I was thinking about quiting school, and start searching a job in open source.. But then she said something interesting:

<biertie> but, I also want to thank you for your blog post :x :p
<mchua> ah, thanks!
<biertie> because I’m considering stopping school -_-
<MooDoo> biertie: why?
<biertie> because they don’t care about foss
<MooDoo> that’s not a reason to stop is it
<biertie> I wanted to help loupgaroublond out, and do a project for them
<biertie> and it’s not good enough, because I could learn something from it!
<biertie> #wtf
<MooDoo> ?
* mchua wrestled with similar things as an undergrad, would be happy to talk with you about this.
<mchua> biertie: if schools don’t care about foss, and everyone who cares about foss leaves school, who’s ever going to bring foss /into/ schools?
<biertie> so then I send a mail to them, about open source, and the about a changing world and blah blah
<biertie> and he thought I was rude then
<biertie> mchua: good point :-)
<mchua> You may decide that you’ve got better things to spend your life on than fighting that fight for however many years you’ve got left, and that’s fine. It is a long and thankless one, but it does make a difference in the long term.
<mchua> biertie: Yeah, it’s a hard balance to strike, and it’s also hard to know how administrators and profs will respond sometimes.

So maybe I should stay at school, and try to fight the big forces in our school, so we can have lessons in a culture where they DO care about foss, and maybe even work with it!

Let me know what you think about it!

why geeks make good lovers

No response, Feb 16, 2010

One of the Universal Truths that lie just beyond the fabric of modern society is the axiom that geeks, along with nerds and other peoples who overinvest in intelligence but boast underdeveloped social skills, make the best lovers. Once people realize this, the sexual revolution that will sweep through western culture will make the seventies look like the fifties, and I’m not talking about wider pants. The reasons why geeks are unparalleled as lovers are simple and many:

Geeks don’t sleep around. Geeks, through their higher IQ and therefore greater understanding of the tragedy of human condition, know that the dice only seem to have more sides on the other side of the table. Hence, they instinctively stay loyal to their lovers through thick and thin. Their social skills are also not well developed enough to support an affair, and frankly, geeks generally aren’t quite sure how they ended up with the lover they have attracted. When you date a geek, you know the geek will be yours until you are done.

Geeks are good at the things they try. When’s the last time you met a geek who didn’t have some secret skill just simmering below the surface of a simple-seeming life, honed in the wee hours of the night? It could be hacking, playing video games, or the ability to insert and remove those stupid computer power plug things from drives without cursing or breaking a finger. Let sex become their new favorite late-night hobby, and you know that a geek won’t quit until he or she has learned how to hack into your brainstem through specific genitalia interfacing in parallel with general dermal and oral bonding.

Geeks are not interested in status. Geeks became geeks because they chose to spend their time doing things that would not necessarily make them popular with everyone else in school, like sports and fashion. The ability to resist peer pressure is important to a geek. This means that a geek is more interested in their or your happiness than looking good to others, which will come in handy when either (a) you need attention, in any sort ranging from the nurturing to the lascivious, and also, because both of those things are not necessarily unorthagonal dimensions, any combination of the two, or (b) you need to be rescued because it is the climax of a teen 80’s movie. Or both.

Geeks haven’t formed bad habits. After years of serially dating lots of other women, many socially successful guys have become too confident to be intimate, think of women only for sex, and don’t have any intention of letting what in their minds is “just another girlfriend” enjoy the last spring roll. Let us not even pry into the diabolical, dark, twisted, and depraved mind of the girl who has serially dated many men. None of this is true of the geek, however. The lack of past romantic partners allows the geek to approach lovers with the zest of the neophyte. Geeks are not full of romantic confidence; however, once coaxed from their emotional holes like tame bunnies, they are eager to please and enjoy their newfound relationship.

Geeks can concentrate. Geeks can focus their energy on one task with the intensity of a hunting cheetah. Granted, the task they are focusing on may have more to do with hunting orcs with a +1 Sword of Piercing rather than hunting gazelles with claws, but the fact remains that a geek, once set upon a task and given Mountain Dew, becomes a tireless slave to their goal. Put a six-pack of Dew on the bedside table and a geek between the sheets, and you have found yourself one relentless lover. When’s the last time all night actually meant all night? When’s the last time you were with someone who, if they needed more of the night, knew how to get it?

Geeks have excellent finger dexterity. Geeks roll dice. Geeks play video games. Geeks flip pages in books. Geeks type a lot, and use characters like ~ and ^ and | that no one else has any use for. Geeks use calculators in postfix notation. As a result, a geek knows how to use his or her fingers to greatest possible effect. Whether you have a button that needs pushing or a joystick that needs joy, a geek is the person for the job.

Geeks have imagination. Once you have found your amazing lover, you wouldn’t want things to become boring. That is where geeks prove their real worth. Replayability is important to the value-conscious video-game playing geek, and this translates to relationships as well. Wouldn’t you want to date someone who has created a Quake 3 mod? Wouldn’t you want to date someone who has written steamy Everquest fan fiction involving elven incest? Wouldn’t you want to date someone who wished they were Morpheus rather than someone who wished they were Barry Bonds?

There are plenty of other reasons why geeks are the best lovers around, but don’t just take my word for it. Find the nearest sexy geek and coax that person into asking you out, even if you have to do so using instant messanger. Remember: the only non-sexy geek is a single geek.

—–

aaaaa, I”m a single geek :(
but you can still send your cv in ;-)
I got this via @miente

FUDcon day 1

No response, Dec 06, 2009

Fudcon takes place at the senecca college, in Toronto. What a modern an beautiful college it is! so, yesterday was barcamp day. I think there were about 200people attending this FUDcon, so that was very nice. We started off with pitching the talks. I pitched 3 talks:
* How to install Fedora (slides)
* How to add and remove software in Fedora
* How to join our community (together with Yaakov)

My first presentation was a real presentation, just let openoffice do the work :-) there were about 25people attending, so I was happy about that!
My second talk was about how to use packagekit, but also how to install xchat, go to #fedora.. I was really happy the people started asking questions, that way I could give tips they really care about. My third talk was again different, there were only 7people, and most of them were already enrolled. But I heard Iwan was even less fortunate, nobody showed up on how Fedora community works.

In the evening we went to the Dave and Busters.. it’s a bar, but what a difference with the bars I’m used in Belgium, so huge! I like the Belgian bars more ;-) Anyhow, we played some eight-ball and had some food and drinks, so that was nice.. When I went back to the hotel around 11pm, I moved the hospitality room in the hotel, to hack on some things.

I went to sleep around 2am, and now I’m still a bit tired, while I’m writing this blog post ;-)

Get to know a Fedora Ambassador or User

No response, Nov 06, 2009

boink boink boink boink boink

Name: Bert “bret” Desmet
IRC nickname: biertie
IRC channels: #fedora, #fedora-ambassadors, #fedora-social, #fedora-nl, #fedora-devel on freenode; #cfk, #ict on Quakenet
Location: Ghent, Belgium

Fedora 12 release party in Belgium

6 responses, Nov 03, 2009

Yes, this will be the first Fedora release party in Belgium since a long time (maybe this IS the first one in Belgium, I don’t know for sure)

So, I hope all the belgian Fedora contributors will come to this event, this would be a great opportunity for a get-together. Off course, also other people are welcome on this event -Fedora users, or people that want to start with linux-. We will help people installing fedora -there will be a local mirror-, try to give them some useful tips, and maybe we’ll throw in a more serious talk too. This is also an opportunity to get to know the Fedora contributors in Belgium.
So, if you’re coming, please register on this page (this _is not_ necessary), but it is useful for us to know how many people are coming!

I created the poster in inkscape, on A4 format, so feel free to print them, and hang the poster in your school / work / wherever you want ;-)

Dutch version
English version
French version
German version

I hope I see you guys there, the 28 of november!

cheers,
Bert

linux tag

No response, Jun 29, 2009

hi all!

long time no seen :)
(on this blog at least)
so, what have I done the last week?

I went to Linux-tag in Berlin as a fedora representative. I did some booth work (#), and was planning on attending some English talks, because my German is… … ehm, not good ;-) but I didn’t make it to the talks, I visited the other booths, and socialised with other people in stead. friday was the first day of fudcon, the Fedora users and developers conference. I was the first time I visited fudcon, but I think it was really interesting!
at the first day we did some hacking, we chilled a bit, and we worked on the presentations for the barcamp.
friday was also fudbar, a fedora event in the ‘en passant’, a restaurant in Berlin, were we could enjoy free pizza’s, and meet up with other FOSS people.

Saturday was barcamp day!
I was planning on giving a talk about the fedora ambassadors project, but I changed the subject (wel, max did) to the event box.
after a quick introduction on what the ambassadors project is to some red hat folks that wanted to join this project, we talked with some other (very important) emea ambassadors about our own eventbox, and we made some decisions about it. so I think there will come a fedora-emea event box!
this night I went eating with the Yaakov, Max and some of the Germans in a steakhouse. I thought it was quite expensive, but the steak was great.
afther our meal, we moved to C-base, were the Ubuntu people had there bbq.

Sunday was the hackfest day,
I worked a bit on my own project (devpoint), Jeroen, Chitlesh, and I had a talk about the spin process, and yeah, we chilled a bit ;-)
in the evening we went to some traditional place in Berlin, were we had a good (traditional?) mael, and some decent beer!
I am used to Belgian beer, and well… this was the first beer I had in Berlin that I could compare to Belgian beer.

Monday I had a breakfast at the hotel, and went toghetter with Jesse to the airport. after I checked in, and went to security blablabla, I took a place near to the security.. there I saw a funny thing, some girl had to open her hand luggage because when they scanned the luggage, they saw a strange object.. so she had to take that out, and guess, it was a vibrator! her parents were not amused, and she was totally embarrassed!

that was so cool to watch :D

so, I can say that I had a great time, I am really happy that I was there

you can find the pictures here: (#). you can copy them, and use them, I wouldn’t bother about the facebook license ;-)

linuxtag / fudcon 2009

2 responses, Jun 01, 2009

as some people already know, I’m going to linuxtag @ berlin. I’ll leave already on Tuesday 23june, and come back to my beloved Belgium (hehe) on Monday 29june. I’ve set up a scheme for the sessions that I will follow.

day 1: wednesday
11:00-12:00 -> openJDK [saal4]
12:00-13:00 -> clustered CIFS for everybody [saal 1]
15:00-16:00 -> successfully working with kernel development process [saal 4]
16:00-18:00 -> fedora booth attendance

day 2: thursday
10:00-12:00 -> fedora booth attendance
12:00-13:00 -> synchronizing a openLDAP with active directory [saal 1]
14:00-16:00 -> fedora booth attendance
16:00-17:00 -> linux resource management and contrainers [saal4]
17:00-18:00 -> weblogin made easy with openID [saal1]

day3: friday
10:30-11:00 -> the linux defenders: stop the trools, protect linux, further inovation [saal 5]
11:00-12:00 -> the open cloud: open source and cloud computing converge [saal 3]
12:00-12:30 -> zimory: a marketplace for cloud computing [saal 3]
15:00-16:00 -> from company creation to co-creation
16:00-17:00 -> refactoring in PHP while going open source [saal 3]

day4: saturday
10:00-11:00 -> open source Xen Hypervisor Comunity [saal 1]
12:00-14:00 -> fedora booth attendance
15:00-16:00 -> security [marshall haus 1]
16:00-16:30 -> highy available virtual infrastructures based on Xen [saal 1]
16:30-17:00 -> the challenge of guest migration [saal 1]
18:00-18:30 -> barcamp wrapup
+some FUDcon stuff :)

day 5: sunday
FUDcon stuff :)

I’ll also give a barcamp about the fedora-ambassadors project, and and a hackfest on SOAS, but I don’t know yet when I have to give them…

I’m staying at the Holliday Inn hotel, toghetter with the other fedora people :) I will schare my room with Loupgaroublond, so that must be fun ^^

See you there! ;-)

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