Events

Software entrepreneur Joel Spolsky says that's a good start, but only part of it: [L]et’s stop talking about “backups.” Doing a backup is too low a bar. Any experienced system administrator will tell you that they have a great backup plan, the trouble comes when you have to restore. And that’s when you discover that: The backed-up files were encrypted with a cryptographically-secure key, the only copy of which was on the machine that was lost The server had enormous amounts of configuration information...

Each day that we spend getting Parker to exist peacefully with the cats brings us closer to the goal of peace and harmony. This, I think, is what Parker fears (and the cats want): (Hat tip DK.) Yesterday, for example, one of the cats (Lily, the boldest) let Parker sniff her. Of course, I had my hand on his collar the whole time, but still, progress. Then, later that day, another cat (Nick, the ball of orange spite that makes Bucky look like a model citizen) tried to hit him for no reason. Oy.

But not this: The Chicago area was bracing for a long, hazardous evening rush hour as it continued to be socked by a major snowstorm that has canceled more than 500 flights, closed more than 150 schools and caused numerous spin-out accidents on expressways. The Illinois State Police is warning of "extreme travel times" for the rush hour. Tonight also will turn bitterly cold with wind chill values as low as -17°C to -24°C. Today's high temperatures are expected to be [around -5°C]. At the peak of the...

The Duke CCMBA has a five-term course called "Culture, Civilization, and Leadership" that gives us structures to help us understand—wait for it—cultures and civilizations. At the end of each term, each team produces a paper analyzing the place in which we started the term. This term, I drew the short straw volunteered to write the first draft. We just submitted the final paper, after a few days of revisions. If you're interested, here it is. We didn't put it in the paper, but throughout the process, I...

It turns out, Raleigh isn't that cold. All my life I've just accepted that Chicago winters build character. But I'm not sure anymore, especially after three sunny, 5°C days here while temperatures back home have skulked around -12°C. Then, today, this: A winter storm warning will be in effect across the Chicago area from this evening through Friday morning. By the end of that warning, anywhere from 15 to 30 cm of a fairly fluffy snow will have come down, according to the National Weather Service. The...

Diane and her sister made Parker a bed for Xmas. I think he likes it: Three guesses what he's staring at.

I mentioned a few days ago that security at Israel's Ben Gurion airport seems to be both stronger and more convenient than U.S. airport security. Bruce Schneier reminds us about the problem: [N]o matter how safe or how wonderful the flying experience on El Al, it is TINY airline by U.S. standards, with only 38 aircraft, 46 destinations, and fewer than two million passengers in 2008. ... In 2008, Ben Gurion served 11.1 million international passengers and 470,000 domestic passengers, roughly comparable...

Would you take more free stuff, or more stuff you pay for? Probably the latter, according to Duke University professor Dan Ariely: DAN ARIELY: ... [T]here's some interesting exceptions [to cheaper prices being better]. And the most interesting one is the price of free. Imagine that one of your co-workers comes to the office with home-baked cookies, and she's offering you the cookies for a very cheap price. Let's say 5 cents per cookie. And she has 100 cookies on the tray, and there are 20 people in the...

It's amazing what you can do with a well-focused dog: Unfortunately, he was focused on a cat. Baby steps.

The Burj Dubai, the tallest building in the world, opens tomorrow. The Chicago Tribune reports on its historical debt to Chicago: [T]he Burj Dubai has a broader -- unmistakably global -- significance for Chicago, which invented the skyscraper in the 1880s, pioneered supertall structures in the mid-1960s and had bragging rights to the world's tallest building title from 1974 to 1996, when Sears (now Willis) Tower wore the crown. These days, the city's cloud-busting architectural achievements aren't...