EMMA: a free Java code coverage tool

EMMA: a free Java code coverage tool: "Until recently, the world of Java development had been plagued by an absurd discrepancy: Java developers had excellent free IDEs, free compilers, free test frameworks but had to rely on code coverage tools that charged an arm and a leg in license fees. As a Java pro, I would like to use the same free coverage tool regardless of whether it is a massive commercial project at work or a small fun project at home. I've created EMMA to be that tool."

Mandaella 

Beust on Disposable email

Otaku, Cedric's weblog: "Disposable email addresses

Given the amount of spam I receive every day, I am extremely reluctant giving away my email address to untrusted parties, especially when I'm pretty sure these people should only ever use that email address once (to send me an activation code, for example). Therefore, I was absolutely delighted when the first disposable email address service appeared (SpamGourmet) and especially when it was followed by two more (Mailinator and DodgeIt). Here is a quick review of these three services."

Slashdot | IGDA Persistent Worlds White Paper Released

Slashdot | IGDA Persistent Worlds White Paper Released: "Posted by Zonk on Friday January 14, @10:51AM
from the white-papers-inc dept.
Elonka writes 'The Online Games SIG of the IGDA has released the latest in a series of White Papers on the online computer gaming industry. The 2004 Persistent Worlds White Paper (80-page, 457K pdf) had several contributors from across the industry, and gives general 'developer to developer' advice, covering everything from a quick overview of major products, to design considerations on multiplayer gameplay and dealing with online communities, to technical considerations, to some stats about the international marketplace, including the rapidly-growing Asian market. Editors included Daniel James of Three Rings Design, makers of Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates, and Gordon Walton, VP and Executive Producer at Sony Online and presenter of the Ten Reasons You Don't Want to Make a Massively Multiplayer Game talk at the 2003 Game Developers Conference.'

"

IRL

Wired News: Real World Doesn't Use a Joystick: "After a recent three-day binge of playing the Japanese cult hit video game Katamari Damacy, Los Angeles artist Kozy Kitchens discovered that walking away from the game was not as easy as putting down her joystick.

In the game, players push around what amounts to a giant tape ball, attempting to make the ball bigger by picking up any and all objects in its path. Kitchens found that her urge to keep picking things up was not so easy to shake.

'I was driving down Venice Boulevard,' recalled her husband, Dan Kitchens, 'and Kozy reached over and grabbed the steering wheel and for a moment was trying to yank it to the right.... (Then) she let go, but kept staring out her window, and then looked back at me kind of stunned and said, 'Sorry. I thought we could pick up that mailbox we just passed.''"

WNYC - Soundcheck: The Year 2004 in Jazz, Poetry & Spoken Word (January 05, 2005)

WNYC - Soundcheck: The Year 2004 in Jazz, Poetry & Spoken Word (January 05, 2005): "The Year 2004 in Jazz, Poetry & Spoken Word
Wednesday, January 05, 2005

The jazz world experienced many highs and lows in 2004. The biggest news was the long-awaited opening of Jazz at Lincoln Center's new $128 million complex on Columbus Circle. The most ambitious and expensive jazz venue in history, it opened in October to rave reviews. But not all the best music happened in big halls or on big labels. Artists like trumpeter Don Byron and pianist Vijay Iyer were busy pushing the art form's boundaries. Joining us today with a look back at the year in jazz is Gene Santoro, critic and author of Highway 61 revisited: The Tangled Roots of American Jazz, Roots, Rock and Country Music. Also on the show: Bob Holman, WNYC poet in residence and proprietor of the performance space Bowery Poetry Club. He joins us here to offer a roundup of the best in spoken word and poetry from this past year, from Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen, to late greats Allen Ginsburg and Lenny Bruce."

UPS Tracking With RSS

UPS Tracking With RSS: "UPS Package Tracking With RSS

Note: This article was originally in the form of a post on my blog.
Overview

I always hated the fact that there was no good 'push' mechanism for getting UPS shipment tracking updates. I don't want to go to their website every hour to see where my package is. I want to be notified when it moves. Of course I immediately thought of RSS, but I couldn't find anyone who had turned the UPS data into a feed. I then decided to make it myself in ASP.NET using C#!

I threw together a working version. The url is in this format: http://www.young-technologies.com/utilities/packagetracking/rsstracking.aspx?Type=UPS&TrackingNumber=XXXXXXXXX where the XXXXXXX's are the UPS tracking number you want to track.

It doesn't use screen scraping, which can be unreliable. If I wrote it that way, I would have to change my interface every time UPS decided to change their website. I found out that UPS had an XML interface to get their tracking information directly. I wrote a .NET dll to make the request, and process the response into an object.

To turn the actual data into an RSS feed, I used a handy class called RSSMaster. They did a great job of making it easy to create an RSS feed from a data source."

I'd rather get Alzheimers...

Boing Boing: Curry cures Alzheimer's?: "Curry cures Alzheimer's?
The pigment that makes curry yellow, curcumin, does a better job at treating Alzheimer's than the majority of drugs being tested. (Interestingly, India has one of the lowest Alzheimer rates in the world.)

The new UCLA-Veterans Affairs study involving genetically altered mice suggests that curcumin, the yellow pigment in curry spice, inhibits the accumulation of destructive beta amyloids in the brains of Alzheimer's patients and also breaks up existing plaques.

Link "

Why Wikipedia Must Jettison Its Anti-Elitism

Why Wikipedia Must Jettison Its Anti-Elitism || kuro5hin.org: "Wikipedia has started to hit the big time. Accordingly, several critical articles have come out, including 'The Faith-Based Encyclopedia' by a former editor-in-chief of Britannica and a very widely-syndicated AP article that was given such titles as 'When Information Access Is So Easy, Truth Can Be Elusive'.

These articles are written by people who appear not to appreciate the merits of Wikipedia fully. I do, however; I co-founded Wikipedia. (I have since left the project.)

Wikipedia does have two big problems, and attention to them is long overdue. These problems could be eliminated by eliminating a single root problem. If the project's managers are not willing to solve it, I fear a fork (a new edition under new management, for the non-techies reading this) will probably be necessary."

Doctorow v Anderson

Must Read

Boing Boing: Cory responds to Wired Editor on DRM: "Cory responds to Wired Editor on DRM
Chris Anderson, the Editor-in-Chief of Wired Magazine, has responded to my blog-post in which I take issue with Wired's latest product-review magazine, which breathes hardly a mention of DRM even as it reviews devices that are all crapped up with studio-paranoia-generated restriction technology."