Splitting the bill evenly
I was just reading an idea for restaurant receipts at signal vs. noise which reminded me of the hardly familiar concept of splitting a restaurant bill evenly among fellow eaters. I was first exposed to this concept a few years ago through a friends episode and somewhat bewildered because it was something i’d never experienced in real life before. Whenever i’ve dined out it was either that someone paid the bill for all guests or people just payed for what they had consumed. Is it considered rude in some places to just pay for what you had?
I wonder if this is a family thing, a local thing, an austrian thing, a european thing or whatever. So how about you – ever split the bill?
Done.
Murphy-willing and if i didn’t fuck up grasping the organizational and bureaucratic minefield known as our curriculum, i’ve passed the final exam for my bachelor of computer sciences degree yesterday. Feels good.
It’s been slow around here but this kinda crunch-time always cuts me offline. As an example, here’s my nnw dock icon when i decided to tackle my backlog this afternoon.
And that’s just two or three days worth of news, mind you.
Radial or Cartesian?
Are you a radial or cartesian person?
Radial people assume that any technological change starts from where we are now — reality is at the center of the map, and every possible change is viewed as a vector, a change from reality with both a direction and a distance. Radial people want to know, of any change, how big a change is it from current practice, in what direction, and at what cost.
Cartesian people assume that any technological change lands you somewhere — reality is just one point of many on the map, and is not especially privileged over other states you could be in. Cartesian people want to know, for any change, where you end up, and what the characteristics of the new landscape are. They are less interested in the cost of getting there.
I’m pretty sure i used to be cartesian, but nowadays i’m more and more moving towards the radial side. Honestly, i think it’s better for your mental disposition and a lot more exciting over here.
However when it comes to spatial mapping, i’m about as hardcore cartesian as it gets. Nothing like polar coordinates to throw me off.
Automated chicken harvesting
Is anyone else reminded of soylent green by the video of the e-z catch harvester? Also, note the “life just got easier” slogan. Almost makes the whole biofood thing seem worthwile. (via boingboing)
OMG, Quicksilver can do this!?
Holy f’, i didn’t know that you can drag quicksilver result icons around! There i’m using it for nine months, finding new functionality on the way, and then i find out about this obvious thing that i wouldn’t have thought of trying in a million years. It’s not like i didn’t find quicksilver indispensable before…
The beautiful thing about this application is that you’ll install it and right out of the box you’ll love it for what you’re using it for. Most likely you won’t use more than 5% of its functionality, but those 5% it does so well you’ll love it. The other 95% of functionality are so elegantly implemented that they won’t get in your way, but as soon as you find out about them you’ll love them as well and use them extensively in your daily workflow and wonder “how the hell could i live without this” and you’ll love quicksilver even more. Hands down this is the most gratifying, useful, productivity-boosting application ever. Go download it yesterday.
