They don’t tell which application is free the coming Friday, but last Friday the free app was: CodeWallet Pro 6 Mobile. It’s now 25% off.

There are also hundreds of free software on the site and almost all of the softwares have trial downloads.

Okay, okay, okay. This is self promotion, but hey, I do get great software.

Among my favorites are:

• Skype (Free)
• Google Maps (Free)
• IM+
• HandiTV
• Dynomite!
• Fizz Traveler
• Mobile Office (View Open Document Format files on your mobile phone)

Basically, you can print any, or heck, even ALL of your emails and have them delivered at your doorstep – just with a single click of a button. They will also print your attachments in glossy paper!

“Photo attachments are printed on high-quality, glossy photo paper, and secured to your Gmail Paper with a paper clip.”

You know what’s really cool? It’s absolutely free and there’s no limit to how many emails you want printed out and delivered at your doorstep.

If you think you can’t take it anymore, it gets even better!

Do you know what today is?

(yeah, I’m bored)

… I quote my officemate, to whom I showed several pictures of me and my Ozzie’s vacation at Taal, Batangas, Bohol, Pagudpud and other wonderful spots in the Philippines.

Ouch.

“Yeah. To tell you the truth… I mean, this is a great country… but if it weren’t for my parents, I wouldn’t be here [in another country]. I would’ve stayed there”, I replied.

I love the Philippines. If you’re a middle-class citizen, everything is fine. Or at least that’s how I feel. Life is wonderful, the culture is rich and the people are great(there are exceptions, of course). Hey, I just learned that the Philippines is now a second-world country.

It all boils down to law and government, doesn’t it? The corruption and injustice… it’s heart-breaking. I remember the first time an MMDA pulled us over because we passed a red light. It was terrifying. “Ser, 3 days na seminar to. Reckless driving yan, blah blah blah”. The stuff that I used to only see on TV – like on “Isumbong mo kay Tulfo” or something, was happening to us. I never really thought corruption was real. Welcome to the real world, hunny. [Now that it got me thinking, I should've let my tears flow. I know a friend who cried and got out of the ticket [i.e. lagay] (girl, syempre. Baka batukan ng pulis pag guy yung umiyak)]

Well, poverty and crime is another thing. A few years back, my purse almost got snatched. (who doesn’t have his own story?) I would’ve let go if I could, but I was holding a book across my chest [Head First Servlets and JSP!]. I was so terrified, I just froze while he was struggling to snatch my purse. Had he aimed for the laptop bag that I was carrying, I wouldn’t be blogging on Cozy right now.

Despite all that, I the Philippines is still my home. I love it there.

“Look at that. It’s like paradise.“, my officemate pointed out.

“Yes, I know.”

I’m not really that excited with DST. It doesn’t really change anything, except that I have to leave when it’s still kind of dark. That’s because thanks to our new VP of Engineering, and his ‘highly encouraged 11-hour workday (excluding lunch)’, it’s also dark by the time we can go home (around this time, sunset is ~8pm, by next month sunset should be ~9pm).

Well, I hope when this ‘highly encouraged 11 hour workday’ is all over, I can enjoy some sunshine.   [I hope the long work-hours won't last till the end of DST. That would be so sad.]

On another instance, I also remember my Ozzie and I had a chat on Skype that went on something like this:

…
Ozzie: Okay.
Me: Okay.
Me: Huh?
Ozzie: Why?
Me: What? I didn’t type that.
Me: What?

Then my brother went to my room and asked how I did that. “Did what?“, I asked. Then it dawned unto me that I was still logged in on Skype on the other PC (that my brother was using at that time), and he was the one typing the other lines.

This is designed behavior, so they say. https://developer.skype.com/jira/browse/SCW-268?page=comments

I’m not going to debate on that. It’s their app. I just think that it’s a security risk (risk due to user stupidity, I guess. ).

I have nothing against Skype. As a matter of fact, I love Skype! The audio and video are excellent. I can’t imagine life without Skype. (The quality is better and much faster than the Gizmo Project and Yahoo Messenger [definitely], IMO)

I’ll just make sure I log out every time, and I’ll be fine.

I recently came across Mobile Office. As far as I know, it is the only mobile application that can view ODFs. This nifty little app can render your OpenDocument texts (.odt), spreadsheets (.ods) and presentations (.odp) on your mobile phone. The Mobile Office renders formatting nicely. I haven’t fully tested the app yet, but it serves its purpose.

.

As I’ve said, it can only view the documents (useful for reading/viewing documents while you’re on the go, or viewing odf email attachments on your phone), but the developers are working on being able to modify the files (Altough there’s no news yet when that will be released).

Unfortunately, this software is only available for S60 and UIQ3. Oh well, another reason why I dislike my Blackberry Pearl.

Stop hiding! I can see you, silly!

Oh, and I can see you too, Duke! Too bad Cozy’s not transparent. Teehee

1. A wicked or evil person; a scoundrel.
2. A dramatic or fictional character who is typically at odds with the hero.
3. Me, if I give away spoilers on the latest episode of Heroes.

Hahahaha.

So what’s with the Birran word? This conversation goes around with Hiro and another character on the show.

N: So, what do you think makes this bomb thing go off?
Hiro: Don’t know. Probably, bad guy?
N: Bad guy?
Hiro: Yes, like birran.
N: What’s that?
Hiro: Birran.
N: Billan?
Hiro: Birran.
N: Villain!
Hiro: Vvvv
N: V.
Hiro: Vvvvvviiirrran.

Teehee… Hiro’s just so funny. (Though nothing beats his one-liner: “Gimme Lraido, please… Poop poop!“)

After more than a month of waiting, they’re finally back! It’s the only reason why I look forward to Mondays.

Tonight’s episode was nothing spectacular, but still very good. They met a new hero btw, and seems like they’ll be meeting more. Nope, I’m not giving away any spoilers, Ozzie might kick my butt.

If you’re one of the few who don’t know what the fuss is all about, in a nutshell, the show is about certain people over the world who discover that they have extraordinary abilities. Therefore, the title “Heroes“. My favorite character is aptly named ‘Hiro‘. Hiro Nakamura is a geeky Japanese dude who can bend time and space-o. Plus, he’ll have a cool-looking sword someday.

(^o^) ===[================>

I took the ‘ability quiz‘ on nbc.com and what do you know? I’m a Hiro!

Fine, fine, fine! I rigged it. I’m a Micah. Hmph. (However fitting Micah’s powers are, I still want to be Hiro-ish)

Too bad I just learned (right after the show) that they started Heroes 360 – an interactive program that only runs while the show is on the air. I have no idea what they show in that interactive program. Oh well, I’ll just have to find out next week. Sigh…

Yeah, I’m a total fan. I even called 1-800-PRIMA16 a while ago. Teehee. (Uh-huh! I also applied for Primatech.)

P.S.
Take a look at this. I’ve never seen a torrent downloading that fast. (Yeah, not even pr0n can beat this!)

Edit: I saw a on my stats a couple of google searches for the Primatech access code, so here it is: MT36.

Have fun!

(WoW: Burning Crusade)

I bought this for my Ozzie at Best Buy. My brother and I got the last two stocks on display.
There was this one guy who wanted to buy it too. Hah, tough luck!

Ozzie: Wag masyado play ng play! (You owe me waaaay much more than this is worth. I went to the mall… so naturally, what does the Hunny do when she’s at the mall?)

By the way, I took this picture using my Pearl’s 1.3MP Camera. Horrible picture quality. My old phone’s camera is still better.

In case you wondered, yeah we have both.
I was terribly annoyed by the amount of logic inside the JSPs I’m refactoring for our company’s web app. I was ranting out to Ozzie, so he asked me that question. Fine, fine, fine! Refactoring Servlets which generate HTML is definitely worse than refactoring JSPs with a ton of scriptlets.

This one cracked me up, though (I laughed so hard, but at the same time I wanted to crack my head open). What will you do when you find code like this?

<!–Scripting elements, directives, actions, Template text, JSTL (if you’re lucky), and what-have-you’s–>

<%
for (int i21=0;i21<dft21.length;i21++)
{
String thisUrl21 = dft21[i21].getURL();
StringBuffer buf83 = new StringBuffer();
StringBuffer buf84 = new StringBuffer();
if (thisUrl21 != null)
{
buf83.append(“<a href=\”");
buf83.append(thisUrl21);
buf83.append(“\” target=\”_blank\”>”);
buf84.append(“</a>”);
}
%>
<%=buf83.toString()%>
<%– some other things (scriptlets & template text) inside the link –%>
<%= buffer84.toString()%>
<%}%>

<!–Scripting elements, directives, actions, Template text, JSTL (if you’re lucky), and what-have-you’s–>

No, dont mind the obscure naming and seemingly random numbers appended to them. JSPs with scripting elements that generate HTML? Oh, this is just so awful! (Mind you, I had to format the code too. It was like they really made it so that the code would be as unreadable as possible)

Hopefully this refactoring and replatforming will get these ‘wtf codes’ out of our system. Here’s hoping!

Hope you guys have fun!

Below is the invitation letter from Prof Quiwa:

Department of Computer Science
College of Engineering
University of the Philippines Diliman

January 05, 2006

Dear CS Alumnus:

The Department of Computer Science, your home for four years or so, is celebrating its 26th Anniversary. As a member of this family, we invite you to come home to see and experience the CS life as we have it today.

The Department has gone through a number of changes — from ES to ECS to CS, from a few lecture rooms to a new building, from ‘the youngest department’ to ’one of the best departments’ in Engineering, from paper to online submission of academic requirements, from a few Radio Shack TRS 80’s running TRSDOS and Basic to fully-equipped laboratories running the latest software. Indeed we have gone through exciting transformations, but still we are the same CS Department that you know.

With 5 Outstanding Engineering Faculty awardees among our faculty members, with 7 Engineering Class Valedictorians, 2 Summa, 40 Magna and 121 Cum Laudes among our 1047 graduates (so far), with several BPI Science, P&G Excellence, and Undergraduate Research Competition winners among our students, and a curriculum that is constantly reviewed and revised to adapt to the dynamic discipline we are in, we keep alive the tradition of excellence that has always been the hallmark of our Department. With 22 CS Week celebrations, annual freshmen orientation and department-sponsored events and competitions, with the newly instituted Mentoring Program and GeeCS for academic-related activities, we continually strive to keep our students well-rounded as well.

No matter what period of the CS Department history you were a part of, no matter what contribution you have made, your Department is waiting for you to be back home. Be a witness to the way it has grown; better yet, be a part of it.

We hope to see you in February 24, 2007.

Very truly yours,

(signed)
Evangel P. Quiwa

Walking down the street one day, I met a woman strolling with her daughter.
“What a lovely child,” I remarked. “In fact, I have two children,” she replied.
The question: What is the probability that both of her children are girls?
Be warned: this question is not as trivial as it may look.

Try to think about the answer before reading on. I might also confuse you.

My answers:

Before reading the ‘warning’, the first answer that popped on my head was 1/2. Her sibling is either a boy, or a girl. So, 1/2.

When I read the warning, I thought… “Oh, ok. There are four options. Girl/Girl, Girl/Boy, Boy/Girl and Boy/Boy. Obviously Boy/Boy isn’t possible, so it’s 1 out of 3. So, 1/3.”

Upon further analysis, I thought, “But what is the probability that the mother walked with the first girl vs the second? I should factor in the probability of ‘the mother picking a particular child to walk with her’. So now, I have eight options (x denoting the fact that the mother strolled with that particular child): xBoy/Boy, Boy/xBoy, xGirl/Boy, Girl/xBoy, xBoy/Girl, Boy/xGirl, xGirl/Girl, Girl/xGirl. There are only 4 possible options, since we know the fact that the mom walked with a girl: xGirl/Boy, Boy/xGirl, xGirl/Girl, Girl/xGirl. There are 2 out of 4 chances that her children are both girls. Which brings us back to 1/2.”

I stick with my last answer. The answer is trivial but the solution isn’t as easy as you’d initially think.

Which solution do you think is the correct one? Do you have another solution?

Let me give you some background:

I just started to maintain some legacy code in our company. Development and deployment is difficult, as it is not the conventional way of doing things in Tomcat.

One of the problems I’m encountering is that if I drop a class file to the classes directory, Tomcat does not recognize that I dropped a new class.

You see, we do not put the servlets and classes on the WEB-INF\classes, common\classes or even the server\classes directory. Instead, we have a folder outside of Tomcat that holds all the class files needed for our web-app. This folder is then included in the CLASSPATH.

Yes, I have turned on servlet reloading on Tomcat, but this does not work. This is because the primordial classloader loads the classes from the CLASSPATH when they are needed. However, the primordial classloader cannot be overridden; and anything it loads cannot be unloaded or reloaded. (Hello! It’s the primordial classloader!) So, when it loads say, class Ozzie (from the CLASSPATH), it will stay loaded. Even if I drop a new Ozzie file, it won’t care. I have to restart Tomcat so I can load the new Ozzie.

This would be different if the Ozzie class were on WEB-INF\classes. If I have servlet reloading turned on, Tomcat would automatically see that I have a new class file. Same thing with the Manager.

But we have a wierd architecture, so I have to live with that. (When I’m doing code reviews, it’s always funny because sometimes I giggle at their [previous] code [The latest funny thing? SQL code on a JSP!]. Yeah, they know it’s funny. One of my officemates calls it ‘sad’. But they’re smarter now. [I hope])

Does anyone know of a way to work around this (except for changing the architecture)? I can’t think of anything, really.

I just can’t stand having to restart Tomcat everytime I drop a class file, since we have a very big web application, and it takes 10-15 minutes for our server to fully start.

Anyway, what am I to do? I really can’t argue (I will *always* lose, whether I’m right or wrong). I just have to find another car.

Honda has a nifty little tool that lets me compare the cars side by side.

These are the 4 cars that I like.

But I’m leaning towards the Civic. (The only reason why I’m having second thoughts is because my brother has the Honda Civic Coupe)

Ain’t it pretty?