Miracles of the internet :-)

The internet can lead to funny things! For example, Chinese researchers reading your publication and not understanding a word ;-)

I got this email today:
---------------------------
Hi Dr. Chris,

After reading your conference paper, 'Herding sheep: live system development for distributed augmented reality', I really interested to know whether this system is also meant for Compaq iPaq running on Linux?

From the conference paper, it is very obvious that the 3D world is developed mainly for Window CE and it was developed using VRML. Yet, this may not perform well on Linux iPaq, because the only 3D viewier for VRML for PocketPC, PocketCortona doesn't support Linux iPaq (for the current version). So, If the system be able to run on Linux iPaq, I would like to know how.

Hope you would reply me. Thanks in advance.

Have a nice day.

Regards,
Chi (the lastname has been ommited to protect the innocent)
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My answer:

Hi!
Please re-read the paper :-)
It contains answers to all your question...
Especially Section 2.4.
.... some more explanations ....
Hope this helps!
Dr. Chris

Chris Road

A co-worker has sent me this picture. It shows a sign reading: Chris Road ;-)

Dan certificate

My brand-new dan certificate! The only 3 things I can read are:
- my name
- shodan (my title)
- the name of the issuer (japanese igo association (nihonkiin)

anyways---I am proud :-)



Update: two Chinese interns (big thanks to Mitra and Beibei!) have translated it for me! Since the document is written in traditional Chinese characters, many Japanese have a hard time undestanding it
:-)

"You finally move forth in the Way of Go after a devoted and patient training, and hereby earn the rank of 1st Dan. You shall henceforth need redoubled efforts in your dedication."

Another game of go

Again, we had to postpone a game at lunchbreak... (see earlier posting tokyo: Go at luchbreak). I am white in this game; black has sealed his next move.

I think it does not look to good for me. Currently I am totally changing my style of play: thickness is everything.

In this position, I have a huge ammount of thickness. However, I failed to utilize my thickness ... My only hope is to kill the group in the bottom left corner. If his sealed move is the 3-3 point in the bottom left, I probably resign the game immediately. Otherwise, an invasion there might give me some hope...

Nintendo Amusement Park

Physical Computing!

Parties

Friday, I will go to this party (arranged by some friends of mine):


I hope it will more be like a Swedish-style party. What do I mean by this? Check out this presentation about cultural differences between England and Sweden (warning: not serious and semi-explicit content): England vs. Sweden (after downloading the file, you might have to rename it to have the suffix .pps).

That reminds me: in October 2003 I was at a party at the Swedish embassy in Tokyo (thanks Alex for taking me there!!). It was pretty enjoyable (smoking a cigar with the ambassador ;-)

It goddesses

An Australian woman doing IT had a clever idea: she wanted to make a calendar to show that women in computer science can be beautiful, too! Basically, this is an admirable idea. However, I find the result quite amusing :-)

Calendar
(especially Liisa makes me want to scream)

Things I enjoy

Since I have returned from the US, I am totally flooded with work... Apart from that, I still find time to enjoy life! For example:

Becoming Shodan in Go. Finally, I understood that killing is worthless :-) Better to make the opponent live small!

Watching art exhibitions like the Pixar exhibit in Tokyo. The "making of" of my favourite Pixar movie was especially interesting: For The Birds. I you haven't seen this short movie: do it now!

I have found some nice Drum and Bass locations in Tokyo! The next couple of weeks, there will be some awesome artists in Tokyo: Photek and Congo Natty!

Currently, we have an intern at work who is cool as shit! His name is Ozan and he is from University of Florida. We watched the last two games of the German national team together. He teaches me things like microcontroller programming, 3D scanning and printing + much more... Wait---isn't he supposed to be just an intern? :-)

I have found the most hillarious website ever. Check out these articles: A True History of Linux, Linux and Windows Compared: The Facts, Linux: A European threat to our computers and much more insanity.

About Linux: I am using XGL now. When will Windows be at this level for a Graphical User Interface? Maybe Windows 2010? Check out this video, it will make you wanna switch to Linux immediately!

Finally, the most enjoyable thing: in 1 month, I will visit Germany!! I cannot wait for the things that are awaiting me: my family, my good old friends, the Dachauer Volksfest, Dangercrew parties and much more!