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I spent the better part of Monday chest deep in the debugger trying to figure out why PAM was seg faulting on one server, but not on another. Was it a difference between RedHat ES and Gentoo? Perhaps a subtle difference in PAM versions? Thank vim for :se invlist. Thus, it was revealed:

There are two lessons to be learned. First, the obvious, vim is awesome. Two, PAM ought to be more tolerant of tabs. Extra credit :se expandtab. In actuality, the real lesson is Occam’s Razor.

In the wake of news regarding the NOAA’s new XML feeds, I’ve updated my Quicksilver plugin. It now uses XML, instead of the clunky, but adorable, METAR format. Since the data is SO easy to parse (thanks, Cocoa!), I was able to quickly add support for all of the data. Currently, I have Quicksilver commands to display the following:

• Weather – provides a summary of current conditions, including Last Updated time
• Temperature
• Dew Point
• Humidity
• Winds
• Visibility

There’s plenty more data, but I’m not sure of how much interest it would be. Easy to add, though. Up next: forecasts via SOAP!

Download: [MYWeatherPlugin.qspkg]

Updated: Note that the new XML data is only for the US. So, I’m going to re-enable the METAR data and include a “Revert to METAR” option.

I use vim. With all of its builtin functionality (syntax highlighting, code folding, code completion, compiler/debugger/shell integration, multiple buffers, window splitting, and my favorite: recordable macros) plus tons of plugins, there’s little that vim can’t do. Plus, it’s available for just about every conceivable platform. I find that vim is far-and-away more powerful than most IDEs. For me. I understand that it’s not for everybody. Though, one can certainly try to impress people with one’s l33t vim skills… Hint: show them code-folding and window splitting (they’ll want to know “Which IDE is that?” ).

• Vim: Seven habits of effective text editing
• Blog of Leonid Mamchenkov :: Vim for Perl developers
• Best of Vim Tips

I’ve been offline due to ISP problems since yesterday evening. That’s alright, though, because being offline gave me a chance to work on my novel… The novel I’m reading, that is.

I’m almost finished updating my Quicksilver Weather Plugin to handle the newly available XML Weather data. I’ll upload soon. I’ve also been thinking that this new XML data might make for a pretty slick little J2ME app…

I’ve re-enabled Comments after making some changes to combat spam. We’ll see how it goes. I’m sure it’s just a matter of time…

Just noticed this WIRED article about how the NOAA is now providing all their weather data via XML. Forecasts, Current Observations, and more are available. There’s even a SOAP interface! Way to go NOAA.

Great timing, since I just finished the first pass on my Quicksilver Weather Plugin. My plugin parses the raw METAR data which is nothing more than space-delimited text. All the data is positional and requires using lookup tables to make it meaningful. Also, my parsing was pretty brute-force as there is no built-in support for Regular Expressions in Cocoa/Objective-C. So, now, instead of a custom (and fragile) parser, I can use the standard (and self-describing) XML feeds. They even include suggested icons!

Ooh. The latest issue of the excellent series, Y: The Last Man came out on Wednesday. Reading Y is like watching the first season of 24: gripping.

I must admit, I’m intrigued by the developments with Dr. Mann’s character. Up to this point, her role has really been overshadowed by Yorick and 355. Oh, baby, not any more.

Saw Primer last weekend. Finally, a real hacker movie. Primer is fast-paced and suspensful with an “indie” feel. Most SciFi movies now-a-days are really just Action movies. Not Primer. Instead of special effects, there’s deep technical jargon. Instead of Virtual Reality, there’s a digital readout from RadioShack.

Primer is reminiscent of Pi and Memento. It reminds me of something else that I can’t quite put my finger on. It’s not quite David Lynch and it’s not quite Philip K. Dick (except maybe Ubik). Whatever it is, it’s certainly good SciFi.

If you’re looking for bisexual Macedonians or witty hobos, though, you’ll likely be disappointed. Or not.

This is my first pass at a weather plugin for Quicksilver. It uses METAR data to display the current conditions.

I kept wanting to be able to quickly see what the temperature was—say, right before walking out the door. Quicksilver is perfect for that: a couple of keystrokes and it’s done. There’s a fair amount of additional data available from the NOAA, but I’m currently only showing the Temperature and Dew Point.

This plugin is my first foray into Cocoa programming. So, I know there’s about a dozen other applications that display the weather, but I just wanted to try my hand at Cocoa, Xcode, and Objective-C.

Download [MYWeatherPlugin.qspkg].

Meeting you here.