Month: June 2005

Open source is inevitable

Red Hat Magazine says “Open source is inevitable“.

After years of fierce competition, Microsoft and Sun have decided to settle lawsuits and set aside their differences. Why? The answer won’t surprise those who know Linux and open source. Today the customer is in charge. See what happened, how history and the open source movement has helped bring us to where we are today, and why open source is inevitable because it allows the customer to take control.

They also have a nice video clip attached (in QuickTime, RealPlayer, and Ogg Theora downloads or RealPlayer stream).

Alternative etymology of the word ‘wise’

I had a revelation recently about etymology of the word ‘wise’. It came to me when I was reading and thinknig about different stages in child’s life. There is one particular period when a child asks one billion questions per second. ‘How does fridge work?’, ‘When did you and mama meet?’, ‘Why is the sky blue?’, etc. In Russian parenting books, this period is sometimes called ‘a why’s age’ (‘почемучки’), meaning an age where a child asks a lot of ‘Why?’ questions.

And than it hit me – why’s age. It sounds a lot like ‘wise’. And it can be connected too – asking lots of questions can make one wise.

I thought that I’ve discovered the etymology of ‘wise’ on my own, without any references. But when I decided to verify that it was indeed so, I found out that I was wrong. Online Etymology Dictionary has this entry for ‘wise’.

I like mine better anyway.

Daily del.icio.us bookmarks

Shared bookmarks for del.icio.us user tvset on 2005-06-20

Whit Monday

I was on my way to the Municipal park with Maxim today. We were passing by few office buildings. The street was empty and silent. There was only one guy in a suit and tie and he was trying to enter one of the buildings. It was locked. He looked around trying to understand what’s going on. Than he took his mobile and dialed a number. Since it was very quiet around I could hear his conversation perfectly. It went like this:

– Hi John. Are you sleeping? Sorry to wake you up…
– …
– It’s 7:50 in the morning.
– …
– Yes, it’s Monday.
– …
– Well, I’m trying to get into the office, but everything is locked and closed. What’s going on? I need to make a conference call with David and Veronica in 15 minutes…
– …
– What?!!! And what holiday is that?
– …
– Oh, I see. Dang! What I am supposed to do now?
– …
– Yeah, true. You’re probably right. I’ll go back to bed. I’ll call them and appologize…
– …
– Thanks, man. Sorry to wake you up. Cheers, mate.

Poor guy woke up, shaved and showered, put on his suit, had a breakfast, drove all the way to his office. And only than he found out that it is Whit Monday today, which is a public holiday. I felt pity for him…

This incident nicely illustrates why I don’t like moving holidays. All public holidays should be on a fixed date to avoid confusion. And those religious beurocratic bastards should be forced to confirm with the regulation. Period.