Roberto Mello

Terceira Conferência Nacional de PostgreSQL

2009-09-23T13:02:00.004-06:00

Eu estarei dando um tutorial de PL/pgSQL durante a Terceira Conferência Nacional de PostgreSQL, que acontecerá nos dia 23 e 24 de Outubro de 2009 no Centro de Convenções da Unicamp, em Campinas, SP.

Será a minha primeira PGCon-BR, como é conhecida a conferência, mas os anos anteriores tem sido de excelente qualidade, e este ano parece que será a melhor de todas. Excelentes tópicos e palestrantes.

Nos vemos em Campinas.

ATUALIZAÇÃO: nota de imprensa do PGCon-BR

Maior evento sobre PostgreSQL da América Latina acontece em Campinas

A Unicamp se prepara para receber a 3ª Conferência Brasileira de PostgreSQL.

Nos dias 23 e 24 de outubro, centenas de estudantes e profissionais de TI terão acesso ao maior evento latino-americano sobre o mais poderoso sistema gerenciador de banco de dados de código livre do mundo, o PostgreSQL.

A programação completa da Conferência já foi confirmada. O evento terá palestras e tutoriais com desenvolvedores nacionais e internacionais de PostgreSQL. Estarão presentes grandes nomes da comunidade internacional como Bruce Momjian, Magnus Hagander e nacional como Fernando Ike, Euler Taveira, Leandro Dutra, Roberto Mello entre outros, que abordarão entre outros temas, as novidades da versão 8.4, técnicas avançadas de monitoramento, ajustes de desempenho, migração de outros bancos de dados, o futuro do PostgreSQL e muito mais.

Além das palestras, o PGCon Brasil 2009 realizará o concurso “O elefante está entre nós’, em que os participantes do evento podem contribuir para a comunidade e ainda concorrer a prêmios inscrevendo-se nas modalidades: melhor consulta ou script, melhor estudo de caso, melhor artigo e melhor história em quadrinhos e concorrer a até 50 prêmios. O regulamento está disponível no site do evento.

A 3º Conferência Brasileira de PostgreSQL acontecerá no Centro de Convenções da Unicamp, em três salas simultâneas. As inscrições pela Internet iniciam no dia 16/08 e vão até o dia 16/10 após essa data ainda será possível inscrever-se diretamente no local do evento.

Mais informações, no site oficial do evento: http://pgcon.postgresql.org.br/2009

Durante anos, uma percepção comum da industria era a de que o PostgreSQL era mais difícil de usar que outros gerenciadores de banco de dados. Apesar de ser visto como o mais poderoso, mais focado em integridade de dados, e estritamente concordante com as especificações SQL, era tido como lento, e muito difícil de instalar e utilizar.

Como muitas impressões formadas no passado, essas ideias antigas e ultrapassadas não refletem a versão atual do PostgreSQL. DBAs, desenvolvedores, gerentes de TI e diretores, podem beneficiar-se com as discussões apresentadas na 3ª PGCon Brasil que contará com a presença de integrantes importantes da equipe de desenvolvimento internacional do PostgreSQL bem como de renomados membros da comunidade PostgreSQL Brasil demonstrando suas experiências e estudos de caso.

Venha discutir sua experiência e descobrir o que o PostgreSQL pode fazer por seu negócio

ProfBay.com Blog

2009-04-30T01:33:00.002-06:00

We started a new ProfBay.com blog updates and announcements. Please see it at http://blog.profbay.com/

Profbay.com Tracks How Profitable Your Sales Are

2009-04-28T16:39:00.006-06:00

I should have written an entry about this much earlier, but I haven't been a good blogger. Shame on me...

We launched ProfBay.com into open beta a couple months ago, and today it made it into two very prominent web sites: Lifehacker.com (ProfBay Tracks How Profitable Your eBay Sales Are) and The Redferret Journal (ProfBay - how much money are you making from eBay?). Needless to say, our sign up rate went through the roof (thanks Redferret and Lifehacker!)

Lifehacker.com said:

If you're a regular lister on eBay, you know how much your items are selling for, but maybe not the hard margins on your best stuff. Free (in beta) web tracker ProfBay aims to help.

ProfBay can't read tea leaves to know how much it cost you to acquire or prep an item for sale, but it does do the hard math on your shipping, eBay's insertion and listing fees, and PayPal take-outs to determine how much you're in the black after sending your item out.

The Redferret Journal said:

ProfBay is a new online application that monitors your eBay account to help you track profitability from your sales. It’s in beta at the moment, and free, but the developers plan to charge a ‘small subscription fee’ sometime in the future. Could be useful for all you budding auction entrepreneurs.

ProfBay.com is all those things, and more. So many eBay sellers sell mostly on the blind, or using clumsy, time-consuming spreadsheets. ProfBay automates this process by importing your completed listings, and giving eBay sellers an overview of how their eBay businesses are doing.

Main features:

Automatic importing of eBay listings
Automatically tracks all expenses, fees, and income
Other income and expenses (including acquisition costs) can be added by the user
Built-in graphs and charts to measure your profit or loss
At-a-glance view of your eBay business
Support for multiple eBay ids
Track item views with a click of a button

In short, ProfBay is an eBay profit and loss analysis tool, and we hope it'll help eBay sellers make more money. Why not give it a try today?

P.S.: To all those who left feedback on our site and on comments, thanks. We know there are a few issues with the site, and we're working on it as fast as possible.

Amazon Photography Exhibit in the Salt Lake City Library

2009-02-25T12:10:00.001-07:00

"When was the last time you saw a collection of photographs published as part of a special report before the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change?"

The Salt Lake Tribune reports that -- until the end of February -- you can see an exhibit of 52 photographs titled "Amazônia Photography". The exhibit "document the forests' beauty and struggle for existence" and is part of a report to the United Nations.

Where: Salt Lake Main Library, 210 E. 400 South, Salt Lake City

When: Mondays through Thursdays, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.; Fridays and Saturdays, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Sundays, 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. Call 801-524-8200 for more information, or visit www.slcpl.ut.us for more information.

A Epidemia da Obesidade nos EUA: O Futuro do Brasil?

2009-01-04T09:51:00.006-07:00

Recentemente eu vi um artigo do meu amigo Mike Howsden onde o secretário de saúde do estado de Nova York, nos Estados Unidos da América, defende um imposto de 18% proposto pelo governador a incidir sob bebidas açucaradas.

Esta semana o New York Times publicou um artigo sobre efeitos da flutuação de açúcar no sangue sobre a memória. Resumindo, o estudo indica que flutuações no nível de glicose (açúcar
no sangue) afetam a formação de memórias permanentes no cérebro. Isso quer dizer que aquele "guaranázinho" ou "coquinha" (ou outros alimentos ricos em açúcar e pobres em fibras) que damos para crianças podem afetar o aprendizado e ajudar a diminuir o rendimento escolar das mesmas. Para quem tem mais de 30 anos -- idade na qual o controle natural de açuçar do corpo começa a não funcionar tão bem -- isso também tem implicações sérias.

Eu já moro nos EUA há quase dez anos. É um tempo considerável. É inevitável que eu faça comparações entre os dois países, já que eu conheço o Brasil melhor que a maioria dos Americanos, e conheço os EUA melhor do que a maioria dos Brasileiros (que costumam falar abrobrinhas enormes sobre os EUA quando eu vou ao Brasil).

Eu passei a maior parte dos meus anos no Brasil em Manaus, no Amazonas, mas também morei em outros estados, como São Paulo e Pará, e em várias cidades. No Amazonas come-se muito peixe, devido à sua abundância e ao gosto do Amazonense, que adora peixe. Mas também toma-se muito refrigerante no Amazonas, e eu só tenho visto isso aumentar nos anos que tenho retornado ao Brasil.

Eu creio que hoje -- nos Estados Unidos, mas aparentemente ainda não no Brasil -- estamos na fase aonde chegamos ao final dos anos 80 em relação ao cigarro: temos informações suficientemente difundidas sobre os danos à saúde do uso exagerado de açúcares refinados -- cujo veículo principal são os refrigerantes -- que estão causando um movimento da sociedade e dos governos contra esses produtos.

No Brasil, a meu ver, tem-se ainda mais um agravante: restaurantes do tipo fast food. Crescendo no Amazonas, tínhamos pouquíssimos restaurantes de fast food de cadeia. Tínhamos inúmeros restaurantes de hambúrguer e lanches, etc. locais, que eram nossos favoritos como adolescentes. Relativamente falando, não comíamos muito hambúrguer em lanches, geralmente uma vez no fim de semana, e a bebida favorita não era o refrigerante, e sim a jarra de suco de laranja ou o meu favorito na época: suco de cupuaçú com leite.

Numa das últimas vezes que fui ao Brasil, fui a um shopping center em Recife e fiquei embasbacado com o que vi: quase todas as mesas da praça da alimentação tinham gente comendo refeições do McDonald's com refrigerante. Quase todas!

McDonald's é algo relativamente novo em Manaus, as primeiras franquias abrindo por volta de 2004, salvo engano. Quando estivemos em Manaus pouco tempo depois da abertura dos McDonald's, muitos amigos nos convidaram entusiasmados para visitar o McDonald's local, nos oferecendo o que eles viam ser o melhor. Quando recusávamos educadamente os convites parecia que éramos alienígenas.

McDonald's, nos EUA, é onde se vai para comer quando não se tem dinheiro, quando você quer algo extremamente barato, mas que você sabe que é ruim. No Brasil McDonald's é caro, bem caro, e visto como o que há de melhor. Ledo engano.

Se continuarmos nesse caminho, como o que vi no shopping em Recife, vamos acabar com o mesmo resultado onde os Americanos se encontram agora: uma epidemia de obesidade, um enorme custo aos cofres públicos para cuidados de saúde decorrentes de doenças que outrora eram inexistentes ou facilmente evitáveis, e gerações de pessoas menos produtivas e menos aptas a concorrer no mercado global. Tudo que um país em desenvolvimento como o Brasil não precisa.

Mudanças simples podem ajudar muito esse quadro sombrio:

Não se precisa de sal em tudo. Aliás, não se precisa de sal em quase nada. Os alimentos já dispõem de sal naturalmente.
Refrigerante deveriam ser algo que tomamos raramente, e não algo que tomamos como água. Além do açúcar, refrigerantes também tem muito sal (que é o que dá aquele ardor refrescante na garganta, para logo em seguida causar mais sede)
Pão integral é melhor.
Todos nós, e especialmente crianças, precisamos de frutas e fibras vegetais, ao invés de doces e alimentos sem fibra nenhuma.

E você, o que me diz?

2009-01-04T09:12:00.003-07:00

"Espírito inquieto, mente buliçosa. Do tempo em que mais se ouvia do que podia falar. As perguntas calavam sem respostas. Os dramas do viver humano, os sofrimentos, as mágoas, as revoltas, as dores me inquietavam e faziam pensar..."

Assim a minha querida mãe começou o seu próprio blog E Você, O Que Me Diz?, e realmente a descrição é totalmente correta. Minha mãe sempre foi fascinada com a mente humana e sempre demonstrou imensa satisfação e realização na sua paixão e profissão de Médica Psiquiatra.

Para nós, em casa, ela sempre demonstrou enorme interesse no bem-estar dos seus pacientes, ficando genuinamente feliz e animada quando eles progrediam durante o seu tratamento com ela. Inúmeras vezes atendi a porta de casa para encontrar pacientes trazendo presentes ou outra forma de agradecimento sincero.

Infelizmente boa parte da população ainda tem a noção errônea que Psiquiatra é "médico de doido" e por isso recusam-se a ver um psiquiatra, preferindo optar por terapias mais "aceitáveis" socialmente. Infelizmente porque isso freqüentemente apenas prolonga o sofrimento do paciente, e por vezes agrava o problema, tornando o tratamento mais longo e doloroso.

A palavra "Psiquiatria" vem do Grego psukhē ‘alma, mente’ + iatreia ‘curar’ (de iatros ‘curador’ ). Eu testemunhei inúmeros pacientes onde essa cura da alma e da mente ocorreram.

E agora que já não mais me encontro sob as asas da minha mãe, sou leitor assíduo do E Você, O Que Me Diz? na busca de continuar recebendo os frutos do conhecimento de uma pessoa com tanta experiência, competência e amor aos "emaranhados da vida humana, as inquietações, os sofrimentos e tambem os caminhos da vitória!" como ela mesmo disse.

Fishing in Utah, and a Bald Eagle

2008-11-27T08:42:00.004-07:00

I went fishing for the second time this year, which is kind of a record for me in Utah. My friend Travis invited me to go fishing with his family, but at the last minute it turned out they were going to a pretty far lake and I didn't want to go that far.

By then there was no way to back out. Rafael was already all excited about fishing. We went to a store, got some bait and drove to Deer creek, a lake in the beautiful Provo canyon that is stocked with fish by the Utah division of wildlife resources. Supposedly. I'm somewhat embarassed to say that in the two times I've been fishing this year I didn't catch anything.

Now I don't have a boat, and people tell me that my experience is a fluke. They say they always catch fish in Utah lakes, with the biggest prize being the famous rainbow trout. Now I come from the Amazon, where I would go fishing with my dad and friends, and we usually caught some tambaqui and tucunaré (like this one in the picture) fairly easily. Granted, we were on boats, away from the city, but still... fishing in Utah is more frustrating than I thought

Even so, we had a good time. It's fun to be alone with Rafael, no distractions and just talk whatever comes to mind. Do some manual labor for a change. The lake was calm, with a few people around fishing too. The lake area is truly nice and well-maintained. Rafael gets really worked up about casting his line, and I just keep hoping he won't get that hook onto something he shouldn't. He casts it pretty well, is remarkably patient for a kid his age and has fun when we're there.

The greatest thing about our last fishing excursion was that we got to see a real, wild American bald eagle. It was just a beautiful animal! I started taking pictures from far away, as I walked closer and closer to the eagle. It let us get as close as we could to it, keeping close tabs on us as we got closer. It would give me this piercing look, straight at my eyes it seemed at times. We spent a good half hour or more just looking at that eagle, marveling at its magnificence.

Just goes to show that there's more to fishing than catching fish.

Warren Buffett thinks he should pay more taxes

2008-10-02T10:38:00.020-06:00

Warren Buffett was just speaking at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit, and I caught a piece of his talk with the senior editor. It was really interesting to hear what seemed like a very straightforward talk, something that seems rare in these crazy days of bank failures and widespread desperation. Here are some things he said:

It's ridiculous that the cleaning lady who cleans my office every day pays more taxes than I do

When we compare the taxes that the 19 people in berkshire hathaway's office pay, I pay the less taxes of all

The top 400 richest people in the the country had their net worth jump 7 times over the last 20 years, and the american worker has just gone nowhere, inflation adjusted

When you have a billionaire like Warren Buffett saying the people who work for him pay too much in taxes when compared to him, well, I don't know how anyone can refute that.

These particular quotes were interesting to me because just yesterday I saw a comparison of McCain's and Obama's tax plans, and McCain -- judging from his proposed tax plan -- disagrees with Buffett:

Under a McCain administration taxpayers in the Warren Buffett bracket would pay 4.4% less in taxes, the biggest tax break of all, while those Mr. Buffett says currently pay too much in taxes (like his cleaning lady) would get barely any breaks (source: Washington Post)

Let's look at two other tidbits of information about McCain versus Obama...

Obama's plan spends more (than McCain's) BUT cuts taxes less than McCain's, and the people who make less money will get bigger tax cuts (and therefore end up with more money.) Source: National Taxpayer Union.

McCain's plan will spend less (than Obama's), but he will be making bigger tax cuts (and mostly for the very rich), which will in turn make it so the government actually spends more.

Both candidates' plans are fiscally irresponsible, but McCain's plan is more so, by 1.5 trillion dollars. Obama would increase the national debt by $3.5 trillion (or $12,000 per American) over 10 years. McCain's plan would increase the national debt of $5 trillion (or $17,000 per American). Source: Tax Policy Center

Parintins: Pure Magic

2008-07-22T11:46:00.005-06:00

I was born and raised in Manaus, in the Amazon, a city that borders the Amazon river. My ancestors are part native indians, part Europeans, like a good chunk of the Brazilian population.

The Amazon culture is very rich in legends, tales, stories, centered around the forest, animals, and everything derived from the native indigenous culture. My dear grandma Olendina used to always tell stories from the years she lived in the country side, in the forest. The Boi Bumbá is part of this rich regional folklore.

"The ritual of the Bumbás shows the legend of Father Francisco and Mother Caitirina who, with the help of the Pajé (indian healer), are able to resuscitate the farm owner's ox. The legend tells that Mother Caitirina, pregnant, wishes to eat the tongue of the farm's most beautiful ox. To satisfy the desire of his wife, Father Francisco kills the farm owner's pet ox. Father Francisco is discovered, tries to escape, but is arrested. To save the ox, a priest and a doctor (the Pajé, in the indian tradition) are called and the ox is resurrected. Father Francisco and Mather Caitirina are pardoned and a great feast takes place." (source: Wikipedia)

In the 9 years that we've been living in the USA, the music (toadas) and lyrics of the boi-bumbá have been one of the best ways we've found to keep connected with our native culture. 2008 was our first time visiting Parintins to watch the Folkloric Festival that happens there every year on the last weekend of June. I confess to being absolutely mesmerized with the beauty of the festival, with the very high degree of refinement, art, and the impecable hospitality of the people of Parintins.

We traveled to Parintins by boat (and returned to Manaus by plane, a mere 45-minute flight), because all flights were booked already, and made all the arrangements at the last minute (I thank my dear sister-in-law Jordana for arranging everything for us). We boarded an express boat, arriving in Parintins 12 hours later. The boat had its interior much like an airplane, with lined-up chairs for the passengers, unlike the regular regional boats ("motor"). Our on board service was actually good, with breakfast, lunch and dinner.

We arrived in Parintins at 6 PM, a couple hours before the start of the Festival. We were in the "galera" (fan base) of the boi Garantido. We've been fans for a while. The party started with deafening (and beautiful) pyrotechnics, followed by the open air opera that tells the legend of the boi bumbá, amazonian legends, its tribes, regional characters, and so on. The costumes -- like the ones in this picture -- are true works of art, the result of the beautiful creativity and dedication of all those who work in the festival all year long.

The floats further take your breath away, each bringing different characters and dancers, with movement and dances that, with the music and energy of the presenting boi's fan base ("galera") create a spetactacle worthy of any major metropolis, but strikingly happen instead in the small island in the middle of the Amazon River. I believe this took the crew of the Bandeirantes TV network by surprise. Bandeirantes broadcasted the entire festivity nationally for the first time.

On Saturday, second day of the Festival, we took a walk through town by taking a tricycle - a bicycle adapted to carry several people. We went downtown, to the harbor, to the local open market bustling with people and souvenirs of each boi bumbá. The strong police presence was striking and welcome, with slogans that referenced the bumbás. In the stands at the bumbódrome (where the party takes place), the police uniforms had colors that matched the different fan bases: red for the Garantido, blue for the Caprichoso.

On the second night we dined at a tiny restaurant across the street from the bumbódrome. I was impressed with the restaurant's cashier, that had a computer, not something you usually see at a street restaurant. Looking from the back of the computer everything seemed normal, until I looked closer and noticed the "monitor" was nothing more than a monitor case being used to keep the money. Another show of creativity from the people of Parintins. My beautiful Juliane is in the picture, along the restaurant's cashier.

On the festival's second night I thought the Garantido boi had the best presentation (each of the 2 competitors presents for 2.5 hours on each of the festival's 3 nights), unlike the first night, where the Caprichoso was clearly the winner. I must admit that the Garantido is the clear owner of my heart, with its beautiful poetry and songs (toadas) and a galera of electrifying energy. I invite all to visit Parintins and experience this fantastic party. It is undoubtedly worth it. I'll finish this post with a montage of the videos I made during the festival. Enjoy. Feel free to ask any questions about the festival, its history and how to visit.

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Parintins: Magia Pura

2008-07-22T11:33:00.003-06:00

Eu nasci e fui criado em Manaus, no Amazonas, uma cidade que fica às margens do Rio Amazonas. Meus ancestrais são em parte nativos do Amazonas, em parte Européia, como grande parte da população Brasileira.

A cultura do Amazonas é riquíssima em lendas, contos, “causos”, em torno da floresta, dos animais, e de tudo derivado da cultura indígena nativa da região. Minha querida avó Olendina sempre contava histórias dos anos em que viveu no interior. O Boi Bumbá faz parte desse rico folclore.

“O ritual dos Bumbás mostra a lenda de Pai Francisco e Mãe Catirina que conseguem, com a ajuda do Pajé, fazer renascer o boi do patrão. Conta a lenda que Mãe Catirina, grávida, deseja comer a língua do boi mais bonito da fazenda. Para satisfazer o desejo da mulher, Pai Francisco manda matar o boi de estimação do patrão. Pai Francisco é descoberto, tenta fugir, mas é preso. Para salvar o boi, um padre e um médico são chamados (o pajé, na tradição indígena) e o boi ressuscita. Pai Francisco e Mãe Catirina são perdoados e há uma grande comemoração.” (fonte: Wikipedia)

Nos 9 anos que estamos morando nos EUA, as músicas (toadas) e letras dos boi-bumbá têm sido uma das melhores maneiras de nos mantermos conectados com a nossa cultura nativa. 2008 foi a nossa primeira vez visitando Parintins para assistir ao Festival Folclórico que acontece lá todo ano no ultimo fim de semana de Junho. Confesso que fiquei absolutamente embasbacado com a beleza de todo o festival, com altíssimo grau de refinamento, arte, e uma cordialidade impecável do povo Parintinense.

Fomos à Parintins de barco (e voltamos de avião, que são apenas 45 minutos de vôo de Manaus), pois todos os vôos já tinham sido esgotados, e arrumamos tudo de última hora (agradeço à minha querida cunhada Jordana que fez tudo para nós). Pegamos um barco expresso, que chegou à ilha de Parintins em 12 horas. O barco tinha o interior como o de um avião, com cadeiras alinhadas para os passageiros, diferente dos barcos regionais comuns ("motor"). Nosso serviço de bordo foi até bom, com direito a café da manhã, almoço e janta.

Chegamos à Parintins às 6 da tarde, quase início do Festival. Ficamos na galera (torcida) do Garantido, pois somos fãs há bastante tempo. A festa começou com uma ensurdecedora queima de fogos, seguida pela ópera a céu aberto que conta a lenda do boi bumbá, lendas da amazônia, das tribos, figuras regionais e por aí adiante. As fantasias - como as mostradas nesta foto - são verdadeiras obras de arte, fruto de linda criatividade e dedicação de todos que trabalham o ano todo no festival.

As alegorias são ainda mais de tirar o fôlego, cada uma trazendo seus personagens e dançarinos, com movimentos e danças, que juntamente com a toada do tema, os versos do amo do boi e a agitação e energia da galera (torcida do boi que está se apresentando), criam um espetáculo digno de qualquer metrópole mundial, e no entretando acontecem numa pequena ilha no meio do Rio Amazonas. Acho que isso assustou à equipe da TV Bandeirantes, que pela primeira vez transmitiu o festival na íntegra em rede nacional.

No Sábado, segundo dia do festival, pela manhã fomos andar pela cidade e pegamos um triciclo - uma bicicleta adaptada para carregar várias pessoas. Fomos ao Centro, ao porto, à feira abarrotada de lembranças de cada boi-bumbá. Algo que sobressaiu foi o ostensivo policiamento, presente em todos os lugares, "caprichosamente garantindo a segurança" como estava escrito em seus uniformes em alusão aos bois Caprichoso e Garantido. Nas arquibancadas os uniformes dos policiais seguiam as cores de cada boi, vermelho no Garantido e Azul no Caprichoso.

Na segunda noite jantamos antes do festival numa barraquinha de esfihas feitas na hora em frente ao bumbódromo. Fiquei impressionado até com o caixa do restaurante de esquina, dotada de computador. Olhando por trás do computador parecia tudo normal, até que olhei pela frente e notei que o "monitor" nada mais era do que o local onde a caixa guardava o dinheiro. Outro indício da criatividade Parintinense. Na foto a minha linda Juliane, ao lado do caixa do restaurante.

Na segunda noite do Festival, eu achei que o Garantido teve a melhor apresentação, ao contrário da primeira, onde o Caprichoso me pareceu o vencedor claro (cada boi se apresenta por 2 horas e meia em cada uma das três noites do festival). Eu devo admitir que o Garantido é claramente o dono do meu coração, com suas lindas poesias e toadas e uma galera de energia eletrizante. Deixo aqui o convite a todos os leitores para que façam uma visita a Parintins para experimentar essa linda festa. Realmente vale a pena, e muito. Termino aqui com uma montagem dos vídeos que fizemos durante as noites do festival. Fique à vontade para fazer quaisquer perguntas a respeito do festival e de como chegar lá.

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New Graphical Tobacco Warnings in Brazilian Cigarrettes and Cigars

2008-07-13T14:11:00.015-06:00

WARNING: This post contains very graphic images.

The Brazilian Health Ministry recently released new pictures that will illustrate the entire backside of cigarrette (and cigar) packs, as well as point-of-sale advertisements. Brazil has had those for a few years, following a George Washington University study showing that the more graphical and bigger the warning, the greater the inhibitting effect it has on the smoker. The messages on tobacco products in the U.S. faired pretty poorly because of their little size, with no pictures.

The old warnings were already very graphical, but the new ones go further. According to the health ministry, the new warnings were designed after studies and targeted straight at the youth, who the ministry says is constantly targeted by tobacco companies.

The new campaign focused in the following areas, with a different picture to illustrate each area: victims of tobacco, gangrene, death, heart attack, toxic smoke, suffering, erectile dysfunction, danger.

The twenty-year-old program to reduce smoking has had positive results. In 1989 the smoking population was 34.8%. In 2003 it was down to 22,4%, and the last survey in state capitals, 16% of the population above 18 years of age. Given that Brazil is the biggest producer and exporter of tobacco products, such government indepedence and action in the public interest is very welcome.

What is your reaction to these pictures?


The use of this product diminishes, impairs or prevents an erection.	This product causes early skin aging.	Inhaling this product's smoke causes pneumonia and bronchitis.

This product contains toxic substances that lead to sickness and death.	The risk of brain stroke is higher with this product	The use of this product leads to death by lung cancer and emphysema

The use of this product causes death by heart diseases	The use of this product obstructs arteries and impairs blood circulation	This product intoxicates the mother and the baby, causing premature birth and death

Nicotine dependence causes sadness, pain and death

The Things You are Reminded of

2008-06-24T18:57:00.000-06:00

I went to get some lab work done in Brazil today. I was surprised to see so many people waiting at the lab’s waiting room. I had to get a numbered ticket and wait to be called on one of those electronic boards.

While I was waiting, an old lady probably in her 60’s came up to the front of the waiting room, with her back straight to the 6 lab receptionists and asked people for help to buy ingredients to make a bone soup.

That is something that you usually never see in the United States. More surprising than the event itself was that:

The lab staff carried on as if nothing was happening. No asking her to stop or leave.
I’d say that out of the 20 people in the lab’s waiting room, some 10 gave the woman some money
The woman asking for help was fairly aggressive, going row by row after the first wave of people had given her money, and at least one time she directly asked one person for help.

To me this reminds me and indicates some things:

This is a common event at this busy location, and probably at any busy location.
People are very used to this type of thing, and they are sympathetic and do help, even though most people at the lab at that time appeared not to be of high economic means.
That lady -- as is probably the case with others in the same situation -- grow a pretty thick skin due to the repeated experience of having to ask for help.

Growing up as a then-rare middle-class person in Brazil, almost everywhere you went there were people asking for money. Often people would ring the door bell of our house and would relay a pretty sad story going on in their lives: sick daughter, just got out of the hospital and need money to pay for the bus fare, some recently-inflicted wound, etc.

Your gut reaction is to help, but eventually it happens too often for you to help everytime. Adding to this unfortunate scenario are the scammers. I remember one guy came asking for help at our house once, and we gave him money. A couple days later the same guy came over, with a different story. He probably forgot that he had been through that neighborhood before.

Eventually we got into a system of help-for-work. If someone asked for help at the house, we would ask them to do some small work around the house in exchange for food and (pretty good) money. Without exception those asking for help would reject the offer and move on to the next house.

My mom was once scammed by a nicely-dressed lady who supposedly had “ran out of gas” and needed money to get her car going again. I remember my mom telling me about the very well executed scam, with the lady being very eloquent. Some time later the same person tried to scam my mom again, at the very same intersection, and received instead a good scolding from my mom.

It’s unfortunate, but eventually you get desensitized to this sort of thing, because it just happens so often. But I was glad to see that -- judging by the people at the lab -- most people do help those who at least appear to be in need.

Contra a Contribuiçao Social da Saúde

2008-06-17T07:47:00.004-06:00

A administração Lula do governo Brasileiro realmente tem um apetite insaciável por dinheiro fácil, um comprometimento com a ineficiência e demonstra a incapacidade de administrar competemente uma área importante como a saúde.

Que outra explicação se dá para a última tentativa de ressuscitar a CPMF com um novo nome que só serve para enganar o povo e roubar a economia da produtividade que ela necessita para competir no mercado interno e internacional. Que descaso gigantesco para com o sacrifício do povo Brasileiro diante de seguidas arrecadações recordes do governo.

Quão vergonhoso da parte do congresso nacional, por aprovar uma medida claramente impopular e desnecessária puramente por motivos políticos, ou quem sabe por pura preguiça de reprovar a medida e mandar o governo procurar administrar melhor com os recursos de que dispõe.

Entre em contato com seus senadores, telefone, mande e-mail, faça o possível para demonstrar aos seus representantes eleitos que essa contribuição deve ser derrubada. Precisamos, como um povo, ser mais ativos e exigir uma reforma tributária justa.

Fixing problems with Debian installation scripts

2008-06-17T07:37:00.003-06:00

Debian packages are usually of very high quality. The packages may have installation scripts that are executed before or after installation or removal. They're called preinst, postinst, prerm, postrm.

Those scripts almost never have to be changed because they rarely have problems, unless you're creating your own packages and make a mistake, like I did. And when you make a mistake in those scripts you may be unable to remove or reinstall the package.

I don't think it's well known that one can easily fix or change installation or removal scripts in Debian packages once the've been installed. My good friend Paul Cannon pointed out to me that you can modify them at /var/lib/dpkg/info/$packagename.{prerm|postrm|preinst|postinst}.

PostgreSQL e Codificações (PostgreSQL and Encodings)

2008-03-05T12:49:00.006-07:00

Uma pergunta freqüente na lista pgbr-geral é "Qual codificação eu devo usar com o PostgreSQL"? Recentemente isso foi discutido novamente, e as mesmas coisas foram discutidas novamente. Tal como seus colegas nos EUA -- onde eu trabalho há 9 anos -- os desenvolvedores de aplicações do Brasil parecem conhecer muito pouco sobre codificações e conjuntos de caracteres.

Eu recomendo o ótimo artigo do Joel Spolsky sobre o assunto. Sem desculpas. Tem que ler. Já leu? Não continue antes de ler.

Numa conversa no canal #postgresql na rede freenode, conversei com a Susanne Ebrecht, que recentemente escreveu um bom resumo do assunto para uma apresentação no grupo de usuários de PostgreSQL da Alemanha. Ela me deu permissão para publicar a apresentação dela. A apresentação entitulada Encoding Issues está disponível aqui. Espero que isso esclareça as dúvidas.

ATUALIZADO [2008-03-07]: Coloquei link para o artigo do Joel Spolsky em Português.

------

A recurring question on the pgbr-geral Brazilian PostgreSQL mailint list is "Which encoding should I use with PostgreSQL?" Recently this was discussed again. Just like their US colleagues -- where I've worked for the last 9 years -- the application developers in Brazil seem to know very little about encodings and character sets.

I recommend the excellent article by Joel Spolsky. No excuses. Got to read it. Have you read it? Don't go on before reading.

During a conversation on the #postgresql channel on the freenode network, I spoke to Susanne Ebrecth, who recently wrote an excellent summary of the subject as it relates to PostgreSQL, for a presentation to the German PostgreSQL Users Group. She kindly gave me permission to publish her presentation.

The presentation entitled Encoding Issues is available here. I hope this helps clear up the matter.

Who is Winning with Software Patents?

2007-09-25T23:08:00.000-06:00

When I worked at Novell, they heavily encouraged us to submit anything and everything for patent review. By submitting an idea -- no matter how crazy it was -- you would receive a free t-shirt. If the idea proved worthy of further patent-exploration, you'd get something else, and if the patent was approved you'd get $1000.

I remember talking to a co-worker about something I wanted to do to our internal Wiki to improve our collaboration, and he said "you should submit this for a patent". That was such a foreign thought to me, but that's the prevailing mentality.

While I was working at Novell ZenWorks, they patented a feature of the new ZenWorks web-based user interface. When the user clicked on something, a little dialog box would pop up, and the rest of the browser screen would fade into a darker shade of gray. Nothing that I had not seen before, but I remember the celebration when they were awarded a patent for some trivial CSS and Javascript. I've seen people unknowingly infringing on Novell's patent in several places.

A company recently sued a slew of other companies (Microsoft, Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, Dell, Lenovo, Toshiba, Viacom, Real, Napster, Samsung, LG, Motorola, Nokia, Sandisk Hewlett-Packard, Acer, Gateway, and Yahoo) for an amazingly original and innovative invention: the playlist. A file with different lines that a program reads and does something with each line. They could probably sue every software company in the U.S. for writing programs that use such "innovative" technology.

"Predictably, Premier appears to have no tangible company history other than patent infringement lawsuits and does not produce any sort of product that competes with any of the companies listed." says the ArsTechnica post. Predictable indeed. Every year 40,000 new software patents are awarded by the USPTO. A record in 2007.

Vonage will likely die from patent litigation. It just lost a $69.5 million case against Sprint, and its shares plummeted yet again. This is after a battle against Verizon that it also preliminarily lost. I'm not sure how much longer they can withstand such a beating. And I wonder why other prominent Voice-Over-IP companies have not been sued yet. Maybe they're busy settling with Verizon and Sprint after the public Vonage crucifixion.

The question I have is: who is really winning with software patents? Vonage certainly isn't. Estimates say it costs $20,000 to check a line of code against patent infringement, and 2 to 10 million to fight one.

An acquaintance, when he found out I was a programmer, eagerly approached me to distill the advantages of going with his firm for software patents. Numbers flew for how many patents they had "gotten through". He certainly is winning. The lawyers certainly are winning. I'm not sure anyone else is.

(No, I'm not against all patents)

[Update: Vonage lost the appeal against Verizon.]

Mozy acquired by EMC

2007-09-23T21:06:00.000-06:00

EMC acquired Mozy for $76 million. Mozy had raised $1.9 million in
venture funding. Not bad at all. Congratulations to Josh Coates, Mozy's CEO and founder, Paul Cannon, a good friend of mine who was one of the first employees, and all the Mozy staff.

Well done.

[Update: Apparently the sale has not been confirmed and until it is, it is just a rumor]

Internet access on a Mac through a Samsung Blackjack

2007-07-02T17:03:00.000-06:00

I recently purchased my first ever Macintosh computer, a Macbook. My previous experience with an Apple machine was back when I was 9 years old, on an Apple II clone they had in my dad's company in Brazil. It was the accounting machine, so I really couldn't play much with it, besides a few BASIC programs I wrote here and there.

Apple machines still are incredibly expensive in Brazil. Like most other computer items, they cost 3-4 times as much as in the United States, an unfortunate consequence of the infamous "Brazil cost" : a combination of incredibly high internal taxation, bureaucratic costs, and tariffs on imported goods, particularly electronics. I'll write more about that later.

This Samsung Blackjack is a Windows mobile 5 device, and technically does not work with Mac OS. This blog post, and this one explain how to make it work using a Blackberry connection script.

I found them a bit confusing (being new to the Macintosh), so I'm correcting the instructions a bit according to my experience, and adding a couple more screenshots. The instructions here are for Cingular. I suppose this would work with other carriers if you get the username, password and "number" to be called.

1) Make sure you can access the internet through your phone. Go to Start -> Internet Explorer and navigate to some known website. I had to go through support after the phone was activated for it to work, and even after they fixed it, it wasn't a few hours had passed that I was able to access the internet through the phone.

2) Download the Blackberry 3G Driver

3) Unzip it.

4) Open a new Finder window by double-clicking on "Macintosh HD". Navigate to Library -> Modem Scripts

5) Drag the three CID files from the zip to the Modem Scripts folder (BlackBerry 3G.CID1, .CID2, and .CID3

6) On yout phone, go to Start -> Settings -> Connections -> USB. Change it to Modem

7) Connect your Blackjack to the computer with the USB Cable

8) On you Mac, click on "apple" (the blue apple on the top left corner of the screen") -> System Preferences -> Network (alternatively, search for "network" on Spotlight, the blue magnifying glass on the top right corner, and click on the "System Preferences - Network" item)

9) Click on Location -> New Location. Enter a name for the connection, such as "Mobile"

10) Click on Show -> SAMSUNG CDMA Technologies.

11) Under the PPP tab, enter the following:

Service Provider: Cingular

Account Name: WAP@CINGULARGPRS.COM

Password: CINGULAR1

Telephone number: WAP.CINGULAR

12) Click on the PPP Options... button and enter the settings as in the picture.

13) Click on the Modem tab, the on the Modem select box and pick the Blackberry CID1 or CID3 entry (CID1 worked for me)

14) Click on Apply Now

15) You should now see the little phone icon on the menu bar. Click on it, then click on Connect

With some luck you should now be connected. I did a little speed test and it wasn't bad: 934 kbps down and 177 kbps up.

Tour of the Amazon with the Byrd Brothers

2007-05-27T20:23:00.001-06:00

Obligatory Picture
Originally uploaded by rlbmello

Ryan Byrd, a good friend of mine from work, accepted my invitation of coming to Brazil during my vacation there. I told him I could show him my home town around, and that he would have a good time.

Thankfully he accepted. He spent a few days in Rio de Janeiro, then flew to Manaus to meet up with us, where we spent three days together exploring Manaus and the Amazon. I took Ryan and his brother David on several tours of the city and its night life, and the forest.

I lived in Manaus most of my life, so I usually don't do the things tourists do. This visit by Ryan gave me a good excuse to revisit sites of this great city and area. I must say that I was impressed by the tour of the forest provided by a local company, Amazon Explorers. It was really professionally run, and we had a great time. It cost R$ 78 (approx. US$ 40) per person, with lunch, boat ride, and canoe rides included.

This album on flickr has some of the pictures of our time together in Manaus. I don't have pictures of the night clubs we hit, but I presume Ryan will put them up on his website.

I had not been to Manaus in 3 and a half years and I was impressed with how much the city had changed in this short time span. The growth is pretty impressive. Many good things happening.

Unfortunately, the local government continues to show chronic signs of myopic thinking. I will post more about that later, maybe on my brasileiro.net site, if I resurrect it, or here.

I had a great time with Ryan and his brother David, and hope they had a good time too. Manaus is definitely worth a visit. Lots of great places, sights and things to see, with some fantastic history behind. Come leave some of your dollars in Manaus: you won't regret it!

Bill Gates, Immigration, Competitiveness and... Punishment

2007-02-26T19:09:00.000-07:00

Bill Gates has again written about the need for better education, better immigration rules and keeping America open to foreign skilled engineers. He basically says that:

Innovation is the main source of economic growth
Workforce is the most important factor
Having good educational system to form future workers is important
Must make it easier for foreign-born scientists and engineers to work for U.S. companies

Gates cites demand for computer scientists growing at 100,000/year, with U.S. supply decreasing, and 65,000 annual H1-B visas. H1-B is a "temporary specialty worker" visa that allows a foreign worked -- usually with a Masters degree or above -- to work in the U.S. for 3 years, renewable for 3 more.

Gates has written many times on this issue recently. Although it's pretty hard to disagree with the first three points Bill Gates makes, his position on immigration has been criticized as being simply a thinly-disguised call for cheaper labor for Microsoft.

When I was going through my Computer Science education at Utah State most of my colleagues were foreign, usually Indian or Chinese. This was particularly striking in my Masters, where the vast majority was foreign. The CS curriculum had a few "weed out" classes designed to shake off those supposedly not able to handle the program.

The first one of those was CS 2200 - Data Structures and Algorithms. When I took it, the class was taught by Dr. Vicki Allan, a loving, extremely intelligent and competent teacher.

She was also ruthless.

The class was heavy on theory and programming. The assignments were difficult and long (AVL Trees, anyone?). There seemed to be no end to them. My wife used to say that my assignments had "a life of their own." Worst of all was the day after assignments were due. Vicky would usually ask "So, how did it go? How long did it take you?". Students would often respond between 20 and 40 hours. She would usually say something like "Huh. It would have taken me 15 minutes." I hated when she said that, mostly because I knew it was true.

The class started with 60-70 students, and by the end of the second week was reduced to maybe 20 students. The class forced you to grow. It was one of the best classes I had. Not my favorite (that was Compiler Design and Construction), but it taught me a lot. Dr. Vicki has written her own thoughts on the difficulties of the class. I remember when I first read that. To this day, when I am faced with a particularly difficult problem, I am reminded of what she taught me.

When I talked to American students who dropped out of the CS program and asked them why they were quitting, the usual response was "I don't want to spend the rest of my life in front of a computer." The detractors usually migrated to the Business Information Systems program of the college of Business. "It's business with e-commerce." In reality, that program didn't teach close to nothing useful about computing, or business, being too shallow in both areas, in my opinion.

The students that remained in the CS program were mostly foreign. But why? I don't think they were any smarter than their American colleagues. The biggest reason they stayed, in my opinion, is that they knew their chances of staying in the U.S. after graduating was much higher with a CS or engineering degree. If that didn't work, they could go back to their countries of origin and be much more valuable with a degree from an American university.

The easiest way for foreign engineers to work in the U.S. is through the H1-B program, but it's a punishing and costly process. It costs an employer about $2,000 in immigration fees, plus whatever attorney fees just to submit an application. If the visa gets approved, it costs $1500 for the employee to change jobs, even for the same position. The visa holder has to travel to the U.S. embassy on his country of origin when visiting home to renew the visa stamped on his passport, incurring travel and immigration fees. The costs for a green card application -- which gives the applicant 10 years of permanent residency -- are much higher, and takes several years to be completed. During that time, the employee cannot easily change employers.

Compared to illegal immigration, where there are no papers to file, no limits on visits to home country, no taxes, no minimal education requirements; the H1-B + green card route is punishing. The current immigration system is designed to punish legal immigration, and reward illegal immigration. It should come as no surprise to anyone that illegal immigration is much more prevalent than legal immigration.

-Roberto

P.S.: If you were in the Computer Science bachelors or masters programs at USU between 1999 and 2004, I'd love to get back in touch with my colleagues.

PostgreSQL RPM vs Debian Packages

2007-02-22T19:33:00.000-07:00

I've been spoiled by Debian.

Today I had to install PostgreSQL into a server at work. It was a Red Hat EL 4 server, with the x86_64 kernel. Luckily -- I thought -- I found RPM packages made by the Command Prompt folks.

Downloading the RPMs was a bit of a pain. The PostgreSQL download service first redirects you to a page where you select a mirror, and when you do the link to the file you want is URL encoded, so it ends up looking like http://wwwmaster.postgresql.org/redir?ftp%3A%2F%2Fftp5.us.postgresql.org%2Fpub%2FPostgreSQL%2Fbinary%2Fv8.2.3%2Flinux%2Frpms%2Fredhat%2Frhel-es-4-x86_64%2Fpostgresql-8.2.3-1PGDG.x86_64.rpm

That looks really amateurish. C'mon folks, you can do much better than that for almost no extra effort (and I'll do the work). How many servers do you work on have a browser up and running? Or even a graphical interface? When I need to get things up on a server, I usually just use wget.

But with the urlencoded link to the file, I can't just paste that into the command. I had to open up a python interpreter, import urllib and urllib.unquote() the URL, then paste that into the command line. That's a lot of unnecessary work because of some (apparently) lazy programming on the PostgreSQL site.

So, I finally grab all the RPMs. I install them. Used to Debian, I expect now to have a functioning PostgreSQL server that I have to tune a little bit to get away from the conservative defaults.

Man, was I wrong.

The RPMs install PostgreSQL, but it doesn't work at all. It doesn't even perform the necessary initdb. The configuration files are not even in place. I had to rpm -ql | grep conf the postgresql package to find out where the config files were. They were in /usr/share/pgsql and they were just fully commented out samples.

So I grab the sample files, and copy them to /etc/sysconfig/pgsql, (which I also found by grepping the package listing) and remove the .sample suffix from each of them. I expected the package to have created /etc/postgresql or something similar, but sysconfig is Red Hat's thing (apparently at least, since Debian doesn't have it), so I let it slide, somewhat grudgingly.

I modify the config files to my liking. I try to start PostgreSQL. Ooops, the packages didn't run initdb, so I have to do that myself. Ok, it seems to have started. I try to get my application to connect and it fails with an ident error. I look at my pg_hba.conf file (it controls how clients connect to the server, hba stands for Host Based Access, I believe.)

I look at my pg_hba.conf and it looks fine, what gives? Well, apparently the config files have to be in /var/lib/pgsql, the directory where the PostgreSQL databases are stored. Now that doesn't make any sense. Configuration files are meant to be put in /etc, not /var, much less the PostgreSQL data directory.

I then modify the /etc/init.d/postgresql script and add -c config_file=/etc/sysconfig/pgsql/postgresql.conf to the line that starts the daemon. I then modify postgresql.conf to have the explicit path to the pg_hba.conf file.

Restart PostgreSQL. It finally works. What a work out! Here's what would have happened in Debian:

aptitude install postgresql-8.1. Apt grabs all the dependencies, install them, and I have a working PostgreSQL installation that I can connect to (locally). That's it.

The config files I may modify if I want to, are somewhere expected: /etc. And they are working files with the right names (i.e. without .sample suffixes that I have to remove)

Yes, I know I could have used yum or something like it to simplify the packages part. But it would still have left everything else to do, and that was the most time-consuming part. With Debian, everything is simpler. It just helps me get the job done faster and simpler. Because package owners have to adhere to a set of standards, packages behave very consistently, which further reduces guess work and helps me be more productive.

So instead of saying "Debian spoiled me", maybe I should have just said "Debian got me used to being productive". And it's hard going back to not being so productive.

Reviews: Wii and Excite Truck

2006-11-15T21:22:00.000-07:00

I have been excited about the Nintendo Wii since I heard about the direction for the Wii (more fun, better way to play, get rid of exclusive focus on graphics). Well, tonight I played the Wii at my local EB Games.

Wii and Wii Remote: First Impressions, and reactions from other players

First things first: The Wii is sleek and pretty. It's tiny in comparison with the Xbox 360, and it appears to be much smaller than the PS3 (which looks like a George Foreman Grill, to me at least). It will be a nice addition to a living room without sticking out like a sore thumb.

The Wii remote controller is incredibly comfortable and lightweight. Like others, I was worried about its responsiveness, but I couldn't notice any lag while playing. The rumble feature is there, but it's pretty subtle, like a cell phone vibrating in your hand, but it is a nice feature. The speaker built-in to the controller is a very nice touch that gives you an iPod click wheel-like feeling of being in control.

It was really interesting to just stand around and watch other people play, or just walk-in, look at the Wii or other people playing, and make comments. Most people made comments like these:

"That's the Wii. Look at how you can drive with the remote" "Wait mom, let me play a little more" "This is so much fun" "You just tilt this thing and... WOW!" "Mama, por favor puedo jugar?" "This rocks. Genius!"

This group had people from all ages: adults, moms, kids, teenagers, young adults (male and female). They were playing and having fun, and it took some effort to play because in order to borrow the wireless controller, you had to go to the store clerk and yield your drivers license.

However, from a minority, I overheard things like these:
"Hey Joe, there's your favorite system, the weaner" "These graphics suck. It's like night and day against the Xbox" "Graphics look ok"

This group was composed pretty much all of young males in their early twenties. Nintendo is absolutely right not to focus on this market. The ones that care only about graphics will go for one of the other consoles, that is if they can afford it.

Excite Truck

The only game they had was Excite Truck. I actually had this game pre-ordered, along with The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. My wife isn't into RPG-type games, but she really enjoys Mario Kart DS, so I was buying this game to play with her and my son.

Well, I'm disappointed at Excite Truck. I expected more from it. I mostly played the Versus mode, where you play against another player, but I did play the regular single-player mode. The controls took a minute to get used to to learn how to avoid oversteering, but the problem with Excite Truck is that it was just kind of neh. There wasn't much to keep me excited in the game play.

Most of the time I was trying to avoid crashing into a tree, and grabbing the power-ups wasn't easy, and when I did pick them up, I don't know what difference they made. Flying around after the jumps was cool and all, but that's not that interesting. In short, there wasn't that much of a challenge to keep me interested.

In Mario Kart DS, even though it's a pretty old game, the game kept me hooked on to it. The item boxes always have a surprise that I could use against other players. The more I raced and won cups, other cups unlocked, more characters unlocked, more cars unlocked. It was exciting to win! Other players not only used stuff from the item boxes against me (some of which I could defend against!), but they could bump me off the road, they each made different funny noises when they passed me (or hit me), etc.

In short, the game is interesting and kept me, my wife (who doesn't really play games), and my son, interested. Not to mention the other play modes you can play besides racing. And all for $35. For $50, I expected a lot more fom Excite Truck. I would pay $30 for it, maybe, but not $50.

So I ended up getting rid of my Excite Truck pre-order, and bought Rayman Raving Rabbids (official site) instead. From the videos I've seen, it seems like this will be much more fun than a run-of-the-mill racing game.

xocaigear.com launches

2006-08-03T12:09:00.000-06:00

My wife just launched xocaigear.com, a web site that sells quality clothing and accessories around the Xocai line of healthy antioxidant dark-chocolate-based products.

If you like Xocai or chocolate (there is a lot of research on the health benefits of dark chocolate out there), you might find a shirt or two you'll like there, so go buy one :-)

McAmazon - How McDonalds eats up the Amazon

2006-04-07T09:40:00.001-06:00

Greenpeace -- after a year-long investigation -- is reporting how food giants Cargill, Bunge and Archer Daniels Midland and McDonald's eat up the Amazon Rain Forest so you can have your McNuggets. See also the article at The Guardian.

As a native of Manaus, in the Brazilian Amazon, and having grown up there, this is extremely saddening to me. Ever since Google Maps came around, every once in a while I look over the Amazon region to see how the devastation is proceeding. Take a look for yourself.

The pace of destruction is mind-boggling. The Brazilian government is for all practical purposes either completely powerless or complacent. The Amazon soil is poor and its ecosystem fragile. In a few decades -- as mentioned in a recent Nature article -- 40% of the Amazon could be gone in the next 50 years.

While it's true that we've been hearing these dire predictions about the Amazon Rain Forest for a while now, the evidence now available is overwhelming and the pace of destruction is quickening. The old villains are still there -- unescrupulous cattle ranchers and loggers -- but they've been joined by massive Soy farmers.

The "low prices" of the "low prices at any cost" philosophy wouldn't be so low if the environmental, humanitarian and social costs were taken into consideration. Slave labor and stolen land and forest are only "free" because they have been stolen.

Converting Quicktime and jpg for a DVD with mplayer and mencoder

2006-02-21T13:05:00.000-07:00

I had this Quicktime video that I wanted to put into a DVD. So I embarked on a quest to find a suitable MPlayer/mencoder command to do so. Here's what I came up with:


mencoder mymovie.mov -o mymovie.mpg -noskip -mc 0.5 -of mpeg -ofps 30 -ovc lavc -oac lavc -lavcopts vcodec=mpeg2video -mpegopts tsaf

The one that bugged me for a bit was the -ofps, for frames per second. At first I gave it a value of 100, thinking it would improve the quality, but that caused the video to be out of sync with the audio. I then watched the fps rate of the original .mov and noticed it was at 30, used that, and voila', it worked.

Another thing I am doing, for the same DVD, is making a slide show from a set of jpegs. I wanted to be able to go back and forth between each slide, using the DVD's remote control. The way I am working that out is to create a menu for each jpeg, and add the jpeg as that menu's background.

I then add a back and forward button that takes the user to the previous or next slide. I haven't yet figured out how to make it so I don't have to hit the remote control arrow, and then hit enter. I'd like to just hit the arrow and it would automatically rewind/advance.

Because the slide show is around 50 images, I don't want to manually add each button. Since I'm using DVDStyler, I modified the project's .xml file directly through a program. Makes it a lot faster.

Yet another thing I want to do on that DVD is take that same set of JPGs and make a movie out of them, with audio. mencoder's man page mentions this command to create an avi from a set of jpeg's:


mencoder "mf://*.jpg" -mp fps=25 -o output.avi -ovc lavc -lavcopts vcodec=mpeg4

That's fine, but I would need different times at each slide. So I'm still looking for how to do that. Let me know if you know a way.

-Roberto