Oui. C’est vrai. Elle est une hottie.

broderic on October 20, 2006

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G4-M-Theuriau-042,
originally uploaded by Vedia.

Esquire’s Women We Love 2006 issue features some obscure women that they love. Nothing comes as obscure as this hottie, Melissa Theuriau. She’s a French tv newscaster. Kicks Katie Couric’s ass in looks, and I bet the sad news about the Iraq war would sound some much sexier coming with a French accent. C’est la guerre.

Infernally Departed

broderic on October 20, 2006

The Departed. The US remake of Infernal Affairs. I had recently watched the original because by coincidence it wound up on my Netflix queue at the same time the US remake debuted.

The original was confusing. Now this may sound cliched but I couldn’t tell the bad guys apart. They were all chinese to me, so that when it was time to remember who the mole was in the police department, I couldn’t pick him out of a police line up. I spent the better part of the movie trying to fathom out what was going on. At least the undercover cop was easy to pick out because he’s the infamous Tony Leung. Supposedly, the other guy is somewhat famous, but I don’t really watch much chinese cop dramas because I am limited to the kung fu genre. Anyway, the original besides confusing me ended in a very bitter tone. You had the mole, who always wanted to be a good cop, make it and the undercover cop not. Like the scene in Heat with Al Pacino and Robert Deniro, their tales where intertwined, and you know that someone loses in the end. In this film, it turns out the good guy was the bad guy. For some time after, I was confused by the turn of events to let the mole live. It felt wrong, but I felt conflicted liking the bitter ending, but not liking that crime triumphed. Heh.

The remake adhered to the premise of the original with lots of the same plot rythms. Along with The Aviator, this pic does not include many grand Scorsese stylings. Scorsese sublimates his style to tell the story. Nicholson on the other hand is always Nicholson. The quiet unfolding of the film under Scorsese was punctuated by Nicholson’s brashness and makes the film seem lively, but the length of the movie was very noticeable. I squirmed for the last half hour waiting for the ending. Of course, there was an american twist in the end. You cannot end an american story embracing the dark side. Unlike the original, the mole gets his comeuppance. This was rather phony. For once, an american film should’ve ended (like the original) with the embrace of bad cops rule. I would’ve liked the bitter ending to have remained.

Mark Wahlberg was the best. Followed by Alec Baldwin. DiCaprio and Damon were alright. The boston accent is teh suck.

Original: 2 of 5 stars.
Remake: 2 of 5 stars

Omaha

broderic on October 17, 2006

Last night went to dinner for a friend’s birthday. While waiting to go,we played a few rounds of poker. Usually, we play Texas Hold’em, but there were only three of us so play had to be loose. That sucks as there is no hiding your bad hands dealt.

Whenever in these situations, I panic because I hate folding on badhands and letting the other guy steal the blinds. It gets worse whenits just head-to-head because you must play because there is no more strategizing then. You can’t wait for a good hand or the other guy isjust going to build his stack with the blinds you’re giving up.

Anyway, we switched to Omaha Hold ’em. Four cards dealt with thecommunity cards as in Texas Hold ’em. But we played it wrong. It seemsyou have to play two cards from your hand. You can’t play one and get four from the community cards! Wow. That’ll make it even more interesting. Check the link for more rules.

Perhaps a game of high-low.

Notes: CS 790 Course Project — Samba

broderic on October 16, 2006

Samba

History

Development Purpose
– UNIX in a Windows dominated world. Cross platform interoperability of file
and printing services.
– Reverse engineered from Microsoft’s proprietary CIFS (Common Internet File
System) and SMB (Server Message Block).
– Similar to network file systems.
– Several transport protocols that it suppports: NetBIOS, TCP/IP, etc.
– Platform independence to access personal files.
– Interoperability.
– Open source development model. Multiple developers.

Key Features
– File and printer sharing. Remote access to files and printers on a network
whether it is a UNIX or Windows machine.
– User authentication and authorization. Security measures and access controls
for files and printers.
– network name resolution. Mapping of a machines IP address to its identification
on a network neighborhood.
– network browsing. Allows graphical browsing of files and printers similar to
Windows File Explorer.
– Transparent interoperability with Window’s network neighborhood.

Windows Network Neighborhood
– Samba strives for being a peer in this aspect of Windows.
– Collection of machines that share files and printer resources.
– Centralized workgroup access to the files as well as authorization.
– Domain controller centralized authentication entity.

SMBD
– Samba’s SMB implementation
– Responsible for receiving service requests from client and provides the shared
file or printer service.

NMBD
– Samba’s naming resoultion and network browsing component.

Authorization Component

Search Strings

broderic on October 12, 2006

Most of the time, this blog is read by the four of my regular readers. Yet, through the magic of Google, some unwitting bastards arrive here not knowing what to expect. It’s funny especially with some of the search strings that lead them here.

Doobie Keebler is the most active. Supposedly, it’s a slang for a marijuana cigarette. In truth, Doobie Keebler is the mispronounced name Matthew Brock asks Jimmy James in the classic NewsRadio episode.

Next is Oksana Akinshina naked! Sorry. I don’t think she’s posed for any nudies. Most of these searches are from foreign lands.

TV blogging

broderic on October 7, 2006

As I sit at home on a Saturday afternoon, I think about some of the television I watched. Basically, I’m trying to catch up with what’s on my tivo.

First, we’ll start with a favorite for the last couple years: The Amazing Race. It’s fair to say that this is showing its age. Like the tired and worn survivor, the Amazing race inn it’s tenth season needs to reinvigorate itself. Of course this won’t happen this season, but the next race needs some changes. This year they started out with twelve teams rather than eleven. In the first episode, they eliminated two teams with one of those eliminations at the half way point of the leg. What would be better is if they eliminated a team at any time. Imagine that all teams make it through the first three legs, then starting after the next RoadBlock the last team finishing getting eliminated. Then it goes unpredictably from there. It would make good drama, but maybe not good racing. At this point, I would be blogging about the show, but I am not therefore I am none too excited about this show right now. Perhaps when I pick a team to root for…

Next, Battlestar Galactica premiered its new season on friday. What a disappointment. Perhaps I wanted Viper battles against Cylon raiders, but it wasn’t too exciting for me. It’s also overtly political. The story being occupation of a planet for the good of the occupied people. Iraq? They’re fucked. Yet, there are some intriguing developments. Is Roslyn a Cylon? Then how’s she going to escape the death squads? Is Baltar?

Thursdays it’s Supernatural. I missed the season opener and tivo did not record it for me. This weeks was about killer clowns. “Can’t sleep clowns will eat me.” At points I was scared. Darn clowns. Thus the X-Files lives!

Thursdays is also Ugly Betty. I just watched my first ep and found it funny as all get out. This is going to be good for the first eps then slowly crash into soap drama. I hope it works and makes it through.

That’s it for now. I want to try a few new shows, but the time is hard to find.

Ghosts of October

broderic on October 3, 2006

The past two days I’ve spent my time reading rather than doing my homework. Actually, it is more like several hours as I couldn’t put the book down. It was a mystery tale, gothic in its ambiance with just a slight touch of the chill you find in one of those Victorian ghost stories that I love. The book? The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield.

I read the blurb review about it. It is as I described, but it is more engrossing than that. When I get into a good book, I read it unendingly. I started on it around 11:00 o’clock Sunday night, put it down at five in the morning only to pick it back up this evening to finish it. It’s that good.

It starts with a mystery. Who is Vida Winter? The renowned author whose life has not been told even though several biographies have been written of her. Upon her last days she lets an book antiquarian tell the story of her life. The true story of her life.

She reveals the sinful beginnings of her father, his lust for her sister and the twins that were born to her. A sort of mania runs through the family from their father, to the siblings on down to the twins. There story and Vida Winter’s is told.

There is a ghost. A ghost of a girl. Dead? Or living? Not til the end do we know the true tragedy of it. And it is that tragedy that is haunting, but amazing.

It’s about family and there dark secrets. It’s about loss and reuinion. It’s about love and it always returns.

The author herself describes the book for those who like to read especially the Bronte ouevre. I am such a reader and it was a page turner. At last, something that was good story. And the story is all there is.

A+