Mindset

When in front of a new task, do you believe that you “have” it and you only need to use or show it? Or do you believe that it’s the matter of effort you put into it?

Prisoner’s dilemma and bullying

Prisoner’s Dilemma is one of the classical games in game theory. It’s an interesting abstraction of a whole class of situations, where two parties can choose between cooperative and non-cooperative behavior. It’s a kind of game where win-win and lose-lose result can be achieved. It doesn’t apply to situations like negotiating a price, where one party’s loss is another’s gain; prisoner’s dilemma applies to situation where two parties form a team and work together.

I’m now 0×20

That’s right, today is my birthday. I’m 0×20 years old now. In hex, of course.

In binary, it’s 100000. Helluva round number, isn’t it?

Surviving at workplace

I managed somehow to survive 4 months with an enemy at the workplace. There are two more coming, so I need to stay alert.

When I started the new job, I thought that D. would become my best friend; that we’ll share interests and work closely together, designing and writing great software.

Marek Bliziński, my father

17th March is my father’s death anniversary. I noticed that English Wikipedia didn’t have an entry about him, so I translated the Polish one.

Lenina was very kind to proofread and correct my translation. Thanks!

Sitting straight

Joanna sent me a link to an article about sitting straight at the desk. It says that sitting straight is bad for backs. Why?

Levent Caglar from the charity BackCare, added: “In general, opening up the angle between the trunk and the thighs in a seated posture is a good idea and it will improve the shape of the spine, making it more like the natural S-shape in a standing posture”.

I disagree with the article, or rather with the conclusion. Sitting straight is good for back. The reason for the researchers to say otherwise is that most of people can’t keep their lower spine in the right position. It’s best to show an example, perhaps with a little exaggeration:

When sitting like this, the spine has its natural, S-like shape. It’s seemingly easy, but in fact it’s not. Most of Europeans can’t do this. And for sure, most of them can’t do that for more than just few minutes.

Most of the people, to set their spine in S-shape, need to lean back. Paraphrasing the article, I would say: Being stiff ‘bad for backs’.

New year, new job, new country

The new year brought lots of new things to me. A new job in a new country, an all that comes along with it. I needed to cancel my flat rent in suburbs of Warsaw, go to Dublin and find myself a place to live.

It all went fine, as I’m currently sitting in a nice apartment in a residential area, about 30 minutes walk from UCD, where I work.

In my new exciting job, I am developing a software package called Genepi, which is designed to perform statistical analysis of genetic data. It is licensed under terms of the General Public License. I am very happy about it ― it’s like a dream come true.

So far, I was mostly writing on my Polish blog, which is being read by my Polish friends and family. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to write both Polish and English blogs. The Polish blog will probably remain my personal blog for the time being.

My trip to Ireland seems to be much easier than the previous one to Denmark. I don’t know exactly, why is that. Maybe it’s that I have more money now? Or more experience? Or simply more luck? Whatever the reason, it is all easy and nice.

Goodbye, Poland

Keeping or changing my blog’s profile

This blog was initially intended to talk about technical Linux things, then switched into data analysis. Now, since my thesis writing is over and I don’t currently do any data analysis in my work, it has become stagnant.

I’m thinking whether to stick with the data analysis and Linux or to allow myself to write about variety of other topics which I’m following at the moment.

My primary `social’ blog happens to be in Polish. There’s a great on-line community on Jogger, a jabber-enabled (and Google Talk-enabled) blogging site. I definitely still want to stick with it, so my blogging time is to be still divided between Polish writing on Jogger and English writing here.

I definitely want to keep on writing in English, to develop my writing or at least keep it in shape. That might be the main reason to widen the topic range. It would be better than not writing at all.

My dream was to create a blog with great articles, something like Stevey Yegge. Perhaps I won’t work out just yet. I’ll stick with writing small notes. The time for great articles will come.

How to choose a good watermelon

Watermelons should be bought as a whole fruits, not in parts. Why? A watermelon that has been cut in half can be wrapped in a plastic bag, but who knows who has touched it with dirty fingers? It’s safer to rely on the insulation of the thick watermelon skin.

How do I know that the watermelon is good, when I can’t see its inside? I gathered some information about it. This knowledge is mixing a folk wisdom with geometry, so don’t expect it to be consistent. It’s just some things I’ve collected.