Geeking, Cooking, and Kitty Playing

Making healthy nutrition bars from scratch

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Wed, 07 Sep 2011 02:24:00 +0000

Andy and I ran into some Larabars when we went to a grocery store in the ferry building in SF. We immediately fell in love with these bars. With no sugar and chemical stuff added, these bars are 100% natural. The sweetness comes from the dried fruit. Unfortunately by being natural, these bars are kinda pricy at least for us poor graduate students.

The good news is, since the ingredients are so simple, we can make them ourselves.

Here is our recipe for Larabars.

What You Need

Dried fruit (dates, jujubes, or even apricots. It's your call.)
Ground Coconut
Coconut oil
Pecans (or almonds)
Mortar and pestle

Crush pecans and dried fruit separately. In the pictures I made two flavors: jujube and apricot.
Mix ground coconut and coconut oil with the crushed dried fruit. Keep crushing the mixture a little longer.
Add the crushed pecans. Mix well.
Shape the mixture using an ice cream scoop or an ice cube tray.
Munch time.

Apricot flavor

Jujube flavor

A quick update

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 07:56:00 +0000

Wow this year is passing by so fast. I still can't believe it's almost Christmas. My advisor says each year gets faster and faster. So maybe this is a sign of me getting older?

Anyway, this year is almost over. I enjoyed a lot teaching the Exploring the Internet class (http://91-113-204-f10.wiki.uml.edu) this semester. It was lots of work of course, together with the two class I was taking, and my research work. But it was fun. I learned a lot, both from my students and myself. Earlier, I just learned that I got A in both classes. My research is going well, slowly. So I guess this year is good.

With this semester over, I'm really glad that I can finally concentrate on my research. Got a conference paper due late January. I also should finish resubmitting a journal paper asap. When I'm done with these papers, I'm going to extend the work of my first paper into another. It's gonna be a busy winter for me. The best part of it is that, if my plan goes well, I'm going to graduate in 2 years! :)

After posting scores into ISIS this weekend for the class I was teaching, this semester is officially behind! :)

Unharness my potential

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Thu, 07 Oct 2010 18:35:00 +0000

This Monday, I stayed up all night to finish a proposal draft. I did it! 30 pages in one night. Wow, I never realized I could have so much potential. Then I started to ponder over how much more work I could get done, and how to do things more efficiently. My ultimate goal is to graduate in two years.

This Ph.D comic says all. Truly we all have our ups and downs. But there's always a better way to organize time. Therefore I'm making a plan to be more efficient.

Below are the things that take up a lot of my time. I'm listing my solutions to save time.

To save time on parking

This semester parking is really a pain. To save time, I should:.

(In pseudo-Python)

#! /usr/bin/python
if (go_to_bed_last_night <= 1am):
        while (6:30am <= 7:30am):
                get_up() 
                go_to_school()
else:
        while (7:30am < time <= 8:00am):
                get_up() 
        while (8:00am <= time < 11:30am): 
                work_at_home()
        while (11:30am <= time < 12:00pm): 
                lunch()
        go_to_school() 
while(1):
        work_hard()

To save time on cooking
Monday -- Friday: simple lunch and dinner
Saturday -- Sunday: quality lunch, simple dinner

To save time on shopping

No shopping list, no go.
The frequency should be less than twice per week. Go right before supermarkets close, to get things fast.
Go to Costco no more then once per week. Only visit in the weekends.
Do NOT go to malls unless absolutely necessary

To save time on TA work

This is the tricky part, since I have to spend lots of time making all the slides because the old version is out of date. Besides borrowing some slides from slideshare.net and give credits, and reminding myself that enough is enough, I can't think of any to save more time.

Misc.

No more than one movie at home per two weeks. Try to stop watching TV. Go to cinemas no more than once per 3 months.
Try to stay away from Google Reader Play, Google Reader, Facebook, Renren, or any social network, unless it's work-related.
Check email less frequently
Do not chat with people in the lab, and do not get involved

Perspective

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 17:35:00 +0000

Perspective: "

For the full article, see Prose Before Hos: Perspective On 9/11 And The Invasions Of Iraq & Afghanistan.

The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D.

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 16:57:00 +0000

This is so true.

The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D.: "

Matthew Might, a computer science professor at the University of Utah, writes: “Every fall, I explain to a fresh batch of Ph.D. students what a Ph.D. is. It’s hard to describe it in words. So, I use pictures.” Here it goes. Matt’s Illustrated Guide:

Imagine a circle that contains all of human knowledge:

By the time you finish elementary school, you know a little:

By the time you finish high school, you know a bit more:

With a bachelor’s degree, you gain a specialty:

A master’s degree deepens that specialty:

Reading research papers takes you to the edge of human knowledge:

Once you’re at the boundary, you focus:

You push at the boundary for a few years:

Until one day, the boundary gives way:

And, that dent you’ve made is called a Ph.D.:

Of course, the world looks different to you now:

So, don’t forget the bigger picture:

Keep pushing.

You can find Matt’s Illustrated Guide hosted on his web site. This guide/reality check is published under a Creative Commons License. You can also buy a print version for $6.50. (The money goes to charity.) Matt offers more insights for Ph.D. students here.

The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D. is a post from: Open Culture. Visit us at www.openculture.com

A Hoodie With a Hidden Vulcan Salute

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Fri, 17 Sep 2010 16:51:00 +0000

Saw this on Google Reader. I'd love to get one of these!

A Hoodie With a Hidden Vulcan Salute: "

From Fashionably Geek: Holy crap that is brilliant. When zipped, it’s just a hand on a hoodie. Unzip and it’s the Vulcan salute. Lie down on your side and it’s the Vulcan shocker.

Product Page ($40)

Once Again, D.C. Boasts the Country's Worst Drivers

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 04:37:00 +0000

Once Again, D.C. Boasts the Country's Worst Drivers: "

Photo by Chris Rief aka Spodie Odie.

Most of the drivers around this region -- whether they're from Maryland, Virginia or the District -- just plain suck. This is not new.

But a new report released by Allstate Insurance Corporation indicates that Washington, D.C. is, in fact, the hellish nexus of American traffic. Washington -- probably because the city, aside from its own crazy drivers, attracts a nightmarish mish-mash of drivers from two other jurisdictions who also have terrible drivers -- finished dead last in the report's rankings. Some other fun facts from the report: D.C. boasts a 95.5 percent 'relative accident likelihood' against the national average and an average of 5.1 years between accidents. (In comparison, the top city on the list, Fort Collins, Colorado, has a negative-31.2 percent accident likelihood and averages 14.5 years between accidents.) Looking for sympathy? Don't look too far: Baltimore finished but one slot ahead of D.C. in 192nd place. Arlington (174th) and Alexandria (177th) didn't fare spectacularly either. Here's a PDF with the complete results.

Of course, like I said, this is just the same old, same old for those of us who live here -- after all, D.C. finished dead last in this exact same report last year. No one can ever accuse us of being inconsistently bad drivers, I guess.

How to traverse a tree in Python

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Fri, 14 May 2010 14:06:00 +0000

I was preparing for an interview. So here's my summary of tree traverse in Python.

1. Using recursion

#! /usr/bin/python

class Node:
        def __init__(self,value,left=None,right=None):
                self.value=value;self.left=left;self.right=right

def traverse(node):
        if node==None: return
        print node.value
        traverse(node.left)
        traverse(node.right)

def main():
        n1=Node(1)
        n2=Node(2)
        n3=Node(3,n1,n2)
        n4=Node(4)
        n5=Node(5,n3,n4)
        traverse(n5)

if __name__ == "__main__":
        main()
"""
Result:

5
3
1
2
4
"""

You may ask: Can I traverse a tree w/o recursion? Surely you can! The easiest way to do so is using a stack. Python has a build-in type--list. It has append() and pop() that can be used as stack push and stack pop.

2. No recursion:

#! /usr/bin/python

def treeWalker(node):
        lifo=[]
        while True:
                print node.value
                if node.left!=None:
                        lifo.append(node)
                        node=node.left
                else:
                        try:
                                node=lifo.pop()
                        except:
                                return None
                        node=node.right

class Node:
        def __init__(self, value, left=None, right=None):
                self.value=value;self.left=left;self.right=right

if __name__ == "__main__":
        n1=Node(1)
        n2=Node(2)
        n3=Node(3,n1,n2)
        n4=Node(4)
        n5=Node(5,n3,n4)
        treeWalker(n5)

"""
Result:
5
3
1
2
4
"""

Java: ==, .equals(), compareTo(), and compare()

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 18:12:00 +0000

Java: ==, .equals(), compareTo(), and compare()

Equality comparison: One way for primitives, Four ways for objects

Comparison	Primitives	Objects
`a == b`, `a != b`	Equal values	Compares references, not values. The use of `==` with object references is generally limited to the following: Comparing to see if a reference is null. Comparing two enum values. This works because there is only one object for each enum constant. You want to know if two references are to the same object
`a.equals(b)`	N/A	Compares values for equality. Because this method is defined in the Object class, from which all other classes are derived, it's automatically defined for every class. However, it doesn't perform an intelligent comparison for most classes unless the class overrides it. It has been defined in a meaningful way for most Java core classes. If it's not defined for a (user) class, it behaves the same as ==. It turns out that defining `equals()` isn't trivial; in fact it's moderately hard to get it right, especially in the case of subclasses. The best treatment of the issues is in Horstmann's Core Java Vol 1. [TODO: Add explanation and example]
`a.compareTo(b)`	N/A	Comparable interface. Compares values and returns an int which tells if the values compare less than, equal, or greater than. If your class objects have a natural order, implement the Comparable interface and define this method. All Java classes that have a natural ordering implement this (String, Double, BigInteger, ...).
`compare(a, b)`	N/A	Comparator interface. Compares values of two objects. This is implemented as part of the Comparator interface, and the typical use is to define one or more small utility classes that implement this, to pass to methods such as `sort()` or for use by sorting data structures such as TreeMap and TreeSet. You might want to create a Comparator object for the following. Multiple comparisions. To provide several different ways to sort somthing. For example, you might want to sort a Person class by name, ID, age, height, ... You would define a Comparator for each of these to pass to the `sort()` method. System class. To provide comparison methods for classes that you have no control over. For example, you could define a Comparator for Strings that compared them by length. Strategy pattern. To implement a Strategey pattern, which is a situation where you want to represent an algorithm as an object that you can pass as a parameter, save in a data structure, etc. If your class objects have one natural sorting order, you may not need this.

Comparing Object references with the `==` and `!=` Operators

The two operators that can be used with object references are comparing for equality (==) and inequality (!=). These operators compare two values to see if they refer to the same object. Although this comparison is very fast, it is often not what you want.

Usually you want to know if the objects have the same value, and not whether two objects are a reference to the same object. For example,

if (name == "Mickey Mouse")   // Legal, but ALMOST SURELY WRONG

This is true only if name is a reference to the same object that "Mickey Mouse" refers to. This will be false if the String in name was read from input or computed (by putting strings together or taking the substring), even though name really does have exactly those characters in it.

Many classes (eg, String) define the equals() method to compare the values of objects.

Comparing Object values with the `equals()` Method

Use the equals() method to compare object values. The equals() method returns a boolean value. The previous example can be fixed by writing:

if (name.equals("Mickey Mouse"))  // Compares values, not refererences.

Because the equals() method makes a == test first, it can be fairly fast when the objects are identical. It only compares the values if the two references are not identical.

Other comparisons - Comparable interface

The equals method and == and != operators test for equality/inequality, but do not provide a way to test for relative values. Some classes (eg, String and other classes with a natural ordering) implement the Comparable interface, which defines a compareTo method. You will want to implement Comparable in your class if you want to use it with Collections.sort() or Arrays.sort() methods.

Defining a Comparator object

As described in the table above on compare(), you can create Comparators to sort any arbitrary way for any class. For example, the String class defines the CASE_INSENSITIVE_ORDER comparator.

If you override equals, you should also override hashCode()

Overriding hashCode(). The hashCode() method of a class is used for hashing in library data structures such as HashSet and HashMap. If you override equals(), you should override hashCode() or your class will not work correctly in these (and some other) data structures.

Shouldn't .equals and .compareTo produce same result?

The general advice is that if a.equals(b) is true, then a.compareTo(b) == 0 should also be true. Curiously, BigDecimal violates this. Look at the Java API documentation for an explanation of the difference. This seems wrong, although their implementation has some plausibiliby.

Other comparison methods

String has the specialized equalsIgnoreCase() and compareToIgnoreCase(). String also supplies the constant String.CASE_INSENSITIVE_ORDER Comparator.

The === operator (Doesn't exist - yet?)

Comparing objects is somewhat awkward, so a === operator has been proposed. One proposal is that
a === b would be the same as ((a == b) || ((a != null) && a.equals(b)))

Common Errors

Using == instead of equals() with Objects: When you want to compare objects, you need to know whether you should use == to see if they are the same object, or equals() to see if they may be a different object, but have the same value. This kind of error can be very hard to find.

25+ Alternative & Open Source Database Engines

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 23:37:00 +0000

25+ Alternative & Open Source Database Engines: "

Almost every web developer has a favorite database that he/she feels comfortable working with as all the tricks & gimmicks are already experienced.

It can be one of the popular databases below:

MySQL

PostgreSQL

MSSQL

SQLite

MS Access

or even simpler ones like XML, text, etc.

It is understandable why these databases are frequently used; they are well-documented, have a community behind them, integrated with most popular CMSs', easy-to-use, offered by most of the hosting companies ,etc..

But there are also many other databases which are getting popular day-by-day & may have advantages over what you're already using.

Here are 25+ open source alternative databases that you may consider using in your next project:

MongoDB

It is an open source, high-performance, scalable, schema-free & document-oriented (JSON-like data schemas) database.

There are ready to use drivers for most popular programming languages like PHP,Python, Perl, Ruby, JavaScript, C++ + more.

Hypertable

Hypertable is a high performance distributed data storage system designed to support applications requiring maximum performance, scalability, and reliability.

It is modeled after Google's BigTable and mostly focuses on large-scale datasets.

Apache CouchDB

A document-oriented database that can be queried and indexed in a MapReduce fashion using JavaScript.

CouchDB offers a RESTful JSON API which can be accessed from any environment allowing HTTP requests

Neo4j

It is an embedded, disk-based, and fully transactional Java persistence engine that stores data structured in graphs rather than tables.

Neo4j offer a massive scalability. It can handle graphs of several billion nodes/relationships/properties on a single machine and can be scaled across multiple machines.

Riak

Riak is a very ideal database for web applications as it combines:

a decentralized key-value store

a flexible map/reduce engine

a friendly HTTP/JSON query interface.

Oracle Berkeley DB

It is an embeddable database engine that provides developers with fast, reliable, local persistence with zero administration.

Oracle Berkeley DB is a library that links directly into your application & enables you to make simple function calls rather than sending messages to a remote server for a better performance.

Apache Cassandra

Cassandra is a highly scalable second-generation distributed database that is used by giants like Facebook, Digg, Twitter, Cisco & more..

It aims to provide a consistent, fault-tolerant & highly available environment for storing data.

Memcached

Memcached is an in-memory key-value store for small chunks of arbitrary data (strings, objects) from results of database calls, API calls, or page rendering.

It is intended for use in speeding up dynamic web applications by alleviating database load.

Firebird

Firebird is a relational database that can run on Linux, Windows & various UNIX platforms.

It offers high performance and powerful language support for stored procedures and triggers.

Redis

Redis is an advanced fast key-value database written in C which can be used like memcached, in front of a traditional database, or on its own.

It has support for many programming languages & used by popular projects like GitHub or Engine Yard.

There is also a PHP client named Rediska for managing Redis databases.

HBase

HBase is a distributed & column-oriented store which can also be called as the Hadoop database.

The project aims to host very large tables like "billions of rows, millions of columns".

It has a REST-ful web service gateway that supports XML, Protobuf, and binary data encoding options.

Keyspace

It is a consistently replicated, fault-tolerant key-value store that works in Windows OS.

Keyspace offers high availability by masking server/network failures & appearing as a single, highly available service.

4store

4store is a database storage and query engine that holds RDF data.

It is written in ANSI C99, designed to run on UNIX-like systems & offers a high performance, scalable & stable platform.

MariaDB

MariaDB is a backward compatible, drop-in replacement branch of the MySQL® Database Server.

It includes all major open source storage engines + the Maria storage engine.

Drizzle

It is a fork of MySQL that focuses on being a reliable database optimized for Cloud and Net applications.

HyperSQL

It is a SQL relational database engine written in Java.

HyperSQL offers a small & fast database engine which has in-memory and disk-based tables, supports embedded/server modes.

Also, it has tools such as a command line SQL tool & GUI query apps.

MonetDB

MonetDB is a database system for high-performance applications in data mining, OLAP, GIS, XML Query, text & multimedia retrieval.

Others

Gladius (PHP flat-file database)

CloudStore

OpenQM (multivalue database)

ScarletDME (multivalue database)

SmallSQL (Java Desktop SQL Database Engine)

LucidDB

HyperGraphDB (graph database)

InfoGrid (graph database)

Apache Derby

hamsterdb

H2 Database

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17 Google Chrome Extensions for Web Designers and Developers

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 23:34:00 +0000

17 Google Chrome Extensions for Web Designers and Developers: "

Firefox is the browser of choice for most designers and developers in part because of the vast selection of add ons that are available. While Chrome does not offer anywhere close to as many extensions (yet), there are still a number that can be very handy for designers and developers. In some cases they are not as robust as the Firefox versions (example, Firebug and Firebug Lite), but if you are using Chrome you may be interested to know about the extensions that are available. Additionally, Chrome comes with some developer tools built in.

In this post we’ll feature 17 of the most useful Chrome extensions for designers and developers. Hopefully in time the selection and quality of Chrome extensions will be able to rival those of Firefox.

Speed Tracer

Speed Tracer is a tool to help you identify and fix performance problems in your web applications. It visualizes metrics that are taken from low level instrumentation points inside of the browser and analyzes them as your application runs. Speed Tracer is available as a Chrome extension and works on all platforms where extensions are currently supported (Windows and Linux).

Firebug Lite

Firebug Lite is a tool for web developers, that allows you to edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page.

Pendule

Pendule displays linked and embedded style sheets of the current page in a new tab. It reloads the style sheets for the current page on the fly, so you don’t have to reload the whole page for each change, and also disables CSS for the current page.

Eye Dropper

Eye Dropper and Color Picker extension which allows you to pick color from any webpage or from advanced color picker.

Aviary Screen Capture

With Aviary Screen Capture you can take a screenshot of any webpage and edit it directly in your browser with Aviary.com applications. Plus convenient access to the Aviary website and tools.

PlainClothes

PlainClothes styles — or rather “unstyles” — the web. Just imagine: text is black, backgrounds are white, unread links are blue, visited links are purple, all links are underlined. Or any other colors you like. And all text is rendered in your default fonts (as defined in “Options” > “Under the Hood” > “Change font and language settings”). Everywhere. Automatically.

Chrome Sniffer

Chrome Sniffer will help web developers to inspect web framework / CMS and javascript libraries running on websites while browsing. An icon will appear on the address bar indicating the detected framework.

Lorem Ipsum Generator

The Lorem Ipsum Generator extension creates random dummy “Lorem Ipsum” text.

Chrome SEO

The Google Chrome SEO Extension provides easy access to Search Engine Optimization Tools that can help you with Competitive Analysis, Keyword Research, Backlink Checks, PageRank Checks and other daily SEO tasks.

IE Tab

IE Tab will allow you to use Internet Explorer to display web pages in a Chrome tab. Some sites can only be displayed using IE, and with this extension you can now see those sites without leaving Chrome. Great for web developers who want to test the IE rendering engine, users who use sites with ActiveX controls, and users who want to use the explorer view for local files (i.e. file:// URLs).

Resolution Test

Resolution Test is an extension for developers to test web pages in different screen resolutions, with an option to define your own resolutions.

MeaureIt!

With MeasureIt! you can draw out a ruler that will help you get the pixel width and height of any elements on a webpage.

Validity

Validity can be used to quickly validate your HTML documents from the address bar. Just click the icon in the address bar to validate the current document without leaving the page. The number of validation errors can be seen in the tool tip.

Snippy

Snippy allows you to grab snippets of web pages and save them for future use. Snippy capture rich contents and preserves formatting, so you can capture paragraphs, images, links and more.

META SEO Inspector

META SEO Inspector can be useful to inspect the meta data found inside web pages, usually not visible while browsing.

LastPass

LastPass is a free online password manager and Form Filler that makes your web browsing easier and more secure.

Google Tasks

The Google Tasks extension allows you to access Google Tasks from any web page at any time. Great for just jotting something down or checking your agenda.

For more design resources please see:

11 Great Resources to Find Free Icons

13 Simple CMS Options

25 jQuery Plugins for Working with Forms

29 Resources for Freelance Designers Operating On a Tight Budget

35 of the Best Icon Sets for Web Designers

A new global visual language for the BBC's digital services

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 23:16:00 +0000

A new global visual language for the BBC's digital services: "

The BBC website began its official life back in December 1997 with this very simple design.

It was a basic offering with two sections to the site. Over time it has grown to encompass a great deal more. However due to the organic way in which the website evolved and the old structure of the business, with dozens of small design teams working independently of each other, the site had a fairly schizophrenic nature once you delved into its depths.

About 2 years ago, after printing out the site onto what has now become jokingly known as the 'Wall of Shame' we decided to embark on an ambitious project, called Global Visual Language 2.0, with the aim of unifying the visual and interaction design of bbc.co.uk and the mobile website.

We created a new wider, centred page template to take advantage of wider screen resolutions and for the first time created an underlying grid.

We rationalised the hundreds of different banner styles into a new global and local branding and navigation system.

We discontinued the scores of different audio and video players and created a universal embedded media player.

And we redesigned the homepage creating a visual style that began to ripple through the site and onto the mobile platform.

We've lived with and loved the distinctly 'web 2.0' design for a while now and it's done us proud. However, time's moved on, and in autumn last year we decided it was time to resurrect the project.

We set out to broaden our ambitions; to create a design philosophy and world-class design standards that all designers across the business could adhere to. We wanted to find the soul of the BBC. We wanted something distinctive and recognisable; we wanted drama. We knew whatever we created needed to be truly cross-platform and that we needed to simplify our user journeys.

We didn't do it on our own. We pulled together representatives from across the business, led by the project's Creative Director, Ben Gammon, to form a Global Design Working Group, and we created a GVL Steering Group to help manage and direct the course of the project. We also went out into the industry to find a partner to co-create the styleguide: Neville Brody and his agency, Research Studios.

After going through a tender process in which we invited six agencies to pitch for the work, we chose Research Studios because we felt they had demonstrated a good insight into the BBC, its public purposes and they way in which it functions. We were also impressed with the work created for the pitch and Neville's back catalogue of work.

Together, over the last four months, we've spent countless hours and created countless iterations of designs, components, mastheads, footers, polar maps, word documents, pdfs and grids... and whilst it's still a work in progress, I'd like to share with you where we're at with both the design philosophy and the latest version of our global visual language styleguide.

We wanted to create a design philosophy, or a set of values, to unite the user experience practitioners across the business. We settled on nine keywords which we think sum up what we're about and what we're trying to achieve:

Modern British

We want to create a modern British design aesthetic, something vibrant and quirky that translates outside our national boundaries.

Current

It needs to feel current and reflect what's happening in the UK right now, in real-time. We curate a timeline of Britain and create links to the past - to our rich archive.

Authentic

Wherever we are heard we need to sound authentic and relevant, warm and human. We want to reference the BBC's iconic design and broadcasting heritage. We value the trust placed in us.

Compelling

We engage our audiences with compelling storytelling. Our voice ranges from serious and authoritative through to witty and entertaining.

Distinctive

We stand out from the crowd. We strike a balance between overly templated, cookie-cutter design and beautiful anarchy. We are bold and dramatic.

Pioneering

We pioneer design innovations that surprise and delight. But we take our audiences with us.

Joined-up

We view all services and platforms as one connected whole but deliver experiences that are sensitive to their context of use.

Universal

Our services are open and accessible. Our interfaces are simple, useful and intuitive.

Best

Our ambition is to be the best digital media brand in the world.

Armed with our new philosophy we began creating conceptual designs for various properties: BBC news, homepage, search, iPlayer, programme pages and the embedded media player.

Through doing this work we began to distill the essence of a new visual style. I'm going to take you through some of the key elements, starting with the page grid.

We took inspiration from many sources. What we were trying to achieve is an underlying grid system that was flexible enough to enable many unique design variations whilst still feeling coherent and considered.

The new grid is based on 31 sixteen pixel columns with two left hand columns that can be split into four, and one wider right hand column, which accommodates the ad formats that appear on the international facing version of the site.

We're looking to create the effect of interwoven vertical and horizontal bands, making a feature of the right hand column across the site.

Along with the 16 pixel vertical grid we've also for the first time got an integrated 8 pixel baseline grid so that we can align elements on a page both vertically and horizontally.

A key feature of the new GVL is a much more dramatic use of typography. As well as Gill Sans we've introduced big bold type in Helvetica or Arial and restricted variations in size so that we have much greater consistency across the site.

Here's an example of it all pulled together on a new story page, and examples of typography styling in promo drawers. We focused on signposting and articulation; you can see the time stamping treatment and signposting for live content.

This is an example of a call to action for a piece of video and a pull quote. You can see again the dramatic use of typography and big bold iconography.

Here's another couple of examples of typographic styling; type over images and the use of scale to create hierarchy and drama in link styling.

We've developed a highlight colour palette for non-branded areas of the site, or areas where the BBC masterbrand talks directly to the audience (eg the BBC homepage, search, some of our genre areas). Each colour has a tonal range to be used in contrast or in unison with each other.

We've also got a neutral palette and a much more restrained usage of gradients where the colours are situated next to each other in each tonal range on the colour wheel.

Our recommendation is that pages have a predominantly neutral colour palette with colour being provided by large and dramatic imagery. The highlight colour is used sparingly to create vibrancy and draw the eye to key areas of the page.

We're moving away from left hand navigation to consistently placed, horizontal navigation across the site. Here's an example from Sport:

We're designing a new look and feel for the embedded media player - it's still a work in progress but you can see the bold calls to action and typography.

We've got four types of carousel - one that fits right hand column, one for the double left hand columns, a full-width version and one that breaks out of the page grid and extends to the browser edges to create a cinematic, full screen experience.

And finally, we've created a new set of icons.

This style guide is a set of page elements that can be pulled together in any number of ways. We wanted to create something that is flexible enough to allow all our brands their full expression whilst uniting them into a coherent user experience. We also wanted to strip out any superfluous decoration and allow the content and imagery to shine through. To me, this new visual language is exciting and refreshing. It feels timeless, yet very of the moment. I hope you agree.

Next steps; we need to finalise the masthead and footer. We're looking at mobile and IPTV as well how we treat social elements on the page (social bookmarking, share functionality, comments, ratings, reviews etc). We'll also be working through the components in the glow widget library and pulling it all together into an audience-facing design and code patterns library along with a new set of standards and guidelines.

I hope you like what you see. We're always interested in your feedback on both the philosophy and the styleguide.

Bronwyn van der Merwe is Head of Design and User Experience, Central Team, BBC FM&T.

Celebrating the Ada Lovelace Day

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 24 Mar 2009 19:24:00 +0000

Apparently today is the Ada Lovelace Day (http://is.gd/eDkM).

Who is Ada? Ada is an awesome lady. She is often credited as being the first computer programmer.

Ada Lovelace was one of the world's first computer programmers, and one of the first people to see computers as more than just a machine for doing sums. She wrote programmes for Charles Babbage's Analytical Engine, a general-purpose computing machine, despite the fact that it was never built. She also wrote the very first description of a computer and of software.

Ada is also a strongly-typed language named after Ada Lovelace. It's a strongly typed language because it has restrictions on how operations involving values having different data types can be intermixed. It's commonly used in military and aviation. The fly-by-wire system software in the Boeing 777 was written in Ada.

Oh yeah, I love this badge I got from SIGCSE 2009:

SIGCSE 2009 Pre-symposium and 1st Day

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 00:08:00 +0000

Finally the SIGCSE 2009 conference is coming. For those who do not know SIGCSE, it's the most prestigious conference all over the world focusing on Computer Science education. It's sponsed by ACM and companies such as Microsoft, Google and Sun. The attendees are mostly professors coming from all over the world to Chattanooga TN for this 5-day event.

The weather in New England is so unpredictable. Originally I planned to go on March 2 from Manchester NH to Chattanooga TN for the SIGCSE conference. But on March 2 we had a huge storm in the New England area. Even when we were still having the storm, on the Manchester airport's website, it still showed my flight "on time", so we had to drive to Manchester for almost one hour in the storm. When we arrived at the airport, I was told that the flight after the connection in DC was cancelled. The airline rescheduled my flight to Manchester -> Philadelphia -> Charlotte -> Chattanooga. But at that time Philadelphia was having a Ground Stop. No planes were allowed to stop there. The flight attendants were not sure if the flight was cancelled or just delayed, so everyone were stuck at the airport. After 8 hours' wait and feeling dehydrated, I finally decided to go the next day.

The next day, which is March 3, I finally went on a flight to Chattanooga TN for the SIGCSE 2009. Chattanooga was colder than I thought, but it's surely a nice city. The hotel I'm staying is called Chattanooga Choo-Choo, belonged to Holiday Inn. Chattanooga Choo-Choo is one of the historic hotels of America.

Quoted from historichotels.org:

From 1909 to 1970, all trains to points south passed through Chattanooga’s famous terminal, which was designed by a 24-year-old architectural student from New York. The terminal’s first plans were modified at the behest of the president of the Southern Railway System to emulate the National Park Bank of New York. Unable to compete with faster modes of travel, trains stopped running in 1970; but the terminal was saved from demolition in 1973 by a group of local investors. The1909 station, with its magnificent 85-foot free-standing dome, is thefocal point of this 24-acre historical property that features exceptional accommodations, spirited dining venues, family fun, and, of course, the finest in Southern hospitality.

This year is the 100 year of Chattanooga Choo-Choo.

View from my room:

Although the conference starts on Thursday Mar. 5, they already have workshops and pre-symposium activities on Tuesday and Wednesday at the convention center. On Wednesday, I attended the session From Java to C# - How, What and Why hosted by Microsoft. C# is still my most favorite programming language. It doesn't have so many bugs as Java, and it is so easy and enjoyable to use. This half-day pre-conference workshop is intended for Java faculty interested in learning more about the .NET platform, C#, and Visual Studio 2008. The preconference is being delivered by Joe Hummel, PhD, Associate Professor of Computer Science at Lake Forest College. Joe has been teaching Microsoft technologies, both academically and professionally, since 1992 and the days of VB3. Joe has created and presented summer workshops on .NET since 2002, and he is the author of LINQ: The Future of Data Access in C# 3.0.

(the convention center)

As part of my volunteer work, I helped out SIGCSE to stuff packets for each attendees on Wednesday. There were numerous people attending this conference. These packets will be handed to the attendees on Thursday at the registration booth.

Some pictures taken at the convention center:

In late afternoon, after I left convention center to go back to my hotel, I chose to walk instead of taking the free shuttle in order to explore downtown Chattanooga.

The shuttles in Chattanooga are completely free, and they are electric, which means that they have zero emissions. You could take any shuttle to go around downtown Chattanooga. These shuttles are also equipped with free Internet access.

Some pictures of downtown Chattanooga:

For more photos, go ahead and check out my picasa album.

Clam Chowder Recipe

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 04:29:00 +0000

Got this recipe from allrecipes.com. I've tried it so many times. It's the best chowder I've ever tried.

Prep Time: 25 Minutes
Cook Time: 25 Minutes
Ready In: 50 Minutes
Servings: 8

Ingredients:

3 (6.5 ounce) cans minced clams
1 cup minced onion
1 cup diced celery
2 cups cubed potatoes
1 cup diced carrots
3/4 cup butter

3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 quart half-and-half cream
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Drain juice from clams into a large skillet over the onions, celery, potatoes and carrots. Add water to cover, and cook over medium heat until tender.
2. Meanwhile, in a large, heavy saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Whisk in flour until smooth. Whisk in cream and stir constantly until thick and smooth. Stir in vegetables and clam juice. Heat through, but do not boil.
3. Stir in clams just before serving. If they cook too much they get tough. When clams are heated through, stir in vinegar, and season with salt and pepper.

Wish Her The Best In Heaven...

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 05:23:00 +0000

Recently, one of my friend passed away in her 27th year of her short life. Back in 1999, she found out she had bone cancer. During these nine years, she not only struggled a lot through all the surgeries, but also managed to win 1 gold metal and several silver metals from the Chinese National Games for the Handicapped and Jiangsu Province Games for the Handicapped. She's truly a fighter. I always remember when we were both in college, she always visited me with her sunshine smile. Right after the first surgery, I went to her house to visit her with several friends. When we arrived, all we saw was a nearly empty house, because her family had sold almost anything including the electronics and furniture to cure her. We felt so sad. Although we wanted to know how the surgery went, none of us dared to ask. "Hey, check out my leg", still with her sunshine smile, she let us see her leg, like nothing happened, although we could tell from her eyes that she just cried before we came in. Her right crus was sawed from the surgery. She smiled and asked us lots of stuff in school, like nothing happened. After we came out of her house, we 7 girls all cried. Always so brave she was. Maybe God love her so much, or maybe God is so cruel that ended her poor life. Now her wish to attend the Beijing 2008 Olympics will never come true. I'm an atheist, but at this point, I hope the existence of gods and heaven, so that she could live a happy life above. Her sunshine smile and her perseverance shall be remembered forever by the people surround her.

geez youtube is hacked

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Tue, 20 Mar 2007 08:05:00 +0000

I opened my browser today and found out Youtube was hacked. Here's a snapshot. I don't know which language they are using. Could someone tell me what does the sentence mean?

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 12:19:00 +0000

This is from "Stanford Report, June 14, 2005 "

'You've got to find what you love,' Jobs says

This is the text of the Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Drive Test

noreply@blogger.com (Beibei) — Mon, 19 Mar 2007 09:03:00 +0000

While some kids in other countries get drive licenses around 15, people in China, on the contrary, usually prepare to drive when they become adults. Yes, lately I've been taking classes in a drive school near my home. My teacher in the drive school always says that to be a good driver, one has to be "fearless, circumspective and never muddleheaded when in trouble". But I have this muddleheaded problem especially in emergency. It's just so hard for me to make things perfect. Anyway, my drive test is coming in 8 days. I have to practice more, and hope things will go fine as they should.

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geez youtube is hacked

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

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