News from the Korfhage family
Saturday 28 January 2012 at 1:32 pm
Pachube is a site that supports streams of data from the Internet of Things. I have a computer that measures temperature once a minute, and sends the data to a Pachube feed. Here is the current temperature:
Then I can, for instance, make a dial with the current temperature:
Hmm, doesn't seem to be working so well. But the small graph works:
Wednesday 25 January 2012 at 11:23 am
I was looking to a reservation at Don Hall's Guest House in Fort Wayne for this week, and got the following:
Wednesday 28 December 2011 at 4:42 pm
One of my favorite winter dishes is Corn and Sausage Chowder. I got this from alt.gourmand, back on April 8, 1987. Steve Fritzinger, of Computer Consoles, Inc., contributed it. The email address is a blast from the past, predating the "@" sign: seismo!rlgvax!jsf.
CORN-CHOWDER-2 in the USENET Cookbook
This chowder is a variation on a family recipe from an old roomate of mine. (She makes it without the sausage, and with more water). It goes very well with most seafood. I am especially fond of it served with crab cakes
Ingredients (Serves 6-8)
1 Polish sausage, cut into thin round slices
6 bacon slices, chopped
1 cup chopped onions
1/4 cup flour
2 cups chicken stock
1 cup water
4 cups corn
2 cups cubed potatoes (pieces about 1/4 in. on a side)
1/8 tsp white pepper
red pepper sauce
2 cups milk
2 Tbsp butter
Procedure:
My notes say that this is good with a sip of Chardonay.
Sunday 11 December 2011 at 2:16 pm
Coconut Milky Oolong at The Tea Spot
A tasty tea. Mild tea with some coconut flavor. A lot of flavored teas don't have much flavor, and taste just like tea. However, this has coconut overtones. It is not a strong coconut, however, like a coconut soda. I think it is pretty good. It is an easy-to-drink tea.
Wednesday 23 November 2011 at 10:37 pm
The Cenobium Project is taking high resolution photographs of Romanesque cloister capitals in Medeterranean churches, and will eventually provide 3-D models. It is specialized, but it is an interesting example of computer usage in archaeology. The pictures show the capitals better than you could seem them in person.
Sunday 06 November 2011 at 12:08 pm
The Kahn Academy got a large grant to expand their work, but evidence is that Kahn isn't the way to teach kids science.
Khan Academy and the Effectiveness of Science Videos
Basically, if you have the wrong ideas to begin with, then you won't pay too much attention to the video and you won't learn anything. A better method was to discuss the misconceptions immediately. The students find it harder, but they actually learn something.
Thursday 27 October 2011 at 04:41 am
Scientific American had an article summarizing a paper about why economic models are always wrong, but the first comment said it more succinctly: given a finite set of points, you can find an infinite number of equations (model parameters) that generate those point. Only one of that infinite number is correct, and you aren't going to find it. Of course, when the model changes over time, it is that much harder.
Climate models are basiclly the same thing, and have the same problem. Which means that all the conclusions based on computer models are a poor basis for changing society.
Monday 24 October 2011 at 11:04 am
Amazing job here inserting synthetic objects into photos.
Rendering Synthetic Objects into Legacy Photographs from Kevin Karsch on Vimeo.
Saturday 08 October 2011 at 8:16 pm
The NY Times has an article that expresses my concern about drones. Basically, everyone will have drones soon enough, and the US is setting the precendent that it is ok to use them to kill people you don't like in other countries. We can expect to be on the receiving end in the not too distant future. If we can kill their people in their home, we should expect to have hostile drones flying over the United States and killing people. The defense contractors are probably ecstatic at the thought of the billions we will be spending on anti-drone defense systems. Drones may have seemed a cheap way to fight a war, but I think that in the end, they will end up costing us a lot of money, and leave us feeling forever uneasy. It will not have been worth it.
What's happening in Willard Korfhage's family.
