Extra88

iTunes4 sharing is HTTP

It looks like the downloading vs. streaming may be only applicable under rather specific circumstances. For one thing, the URL includes a "session-id" which is probably only generated when the iTunes4 client requests the track. It would be interesting to see if that URL could be used to stream the track using a different player on a different computer. The different player part shouldn't matter since pudge is using "curl" as a client to download the file but I wonder if iTunes4 on the server side ties the IP address of the client to the session-id. Probably not.

About the daap: protocol, it's not clear how you might construct a URL to point to a specific playlist or track or if it's even possible. A program called ServerStore has been made as a way to access a list of available iTunes sharing servers and quickly connect to them.

Someone else is working on a more detailed (and inscrutable!) examination of the sharing protocl.

Oh, and in case it wasn't obvious, iTunes4 only shares music when it's actually running. If the server quits iTunes4, clients can't listen.

Liquid Bandage Usability

I recently had to have my skin professionally opened. I thought the procedure would culminate in stiches but I was hoping, it being the 21st century and all, that it would be more like building a model airplane than hemming pants. Unfortunately it was neither, it was more like construction workers covering a pothole with a steel plank except this pothole oozed and stuck to the "plank." This made removal of the plank rather painful but subsequent, self-applied planks were of a non-stick variety.

Send me a S.A.S.E. for a translation of the paragraph above.

Colossal Colon

Exhibit visitors who crawl through the colon will see various stages of disease from polyps to full-blown colon cancer. The Colossal Colon was created in honor of Amanda Sherwood Roberts, who died from the disease last year. "We're trying to educate as many people as we can so nobody has to go through what we had to go through," said Amanda's father, Bernie Sherwood.

I'm sorry Bernie but a 40 ft. simulated colon is something else I don't want to "go through."

90% Give Away Password

"Workers were asked a series of questions which included: What is your password? Three in four (75 per cent) of people immediately gave their password."

The other 15 percent gave it up after just a couple of leading questions.

"Of the 152 office workers surveyed many explained the origin of their passwords. The most common password was "password" (12 per cent) and the most popular category was their own name (16 per cent) followed by their football team (11 per cent) and date of birth (8 per cent)."

The methods used weren't very scientific but I think the results are probably pretty representative.

Slashdot put this story in their "Funny" category which tells you what computer geeks think.

Masked Wrestler Wins Japan Assembly Seat

A professional wrestler who fought his way to victory in local assembly elections under his ring name and wearing his trademark mask has vowed the mask will not leave his face even after he enters the staid halls of Japanese politics.

"This is my face," the wrestler -- known as "The Great Sasuke" -- was quoted by the Nikkan Sports newspaper as saying of his black and white full-face mask with bright scarlet streaks and golden wings by the eye holes." American politics is so boring. Jesse Ventura never even wore a mask.

"Music"al oddities

Soundgarden's Black Hole Sun by Steve & Eydie

Leonard Nimoy "singing" Put a Little Love in Your Heart

Johnny Cash singing I Walk the Line in German. There's a whole "in German" section.

You might have heard of "mash ups," where someone strips the vocal track from one song and replaces it with the vocals of another song. I've only heard a couple and didn't think too much of them until now. This is Eminem lyrics over some classic ragtime music. I almost wet myself laughing.
Eminem vs. Ragtime (Uncensored) by Freelance Hairdresser

Eminem With or Without Me has a whole collection of Eminem mash-ups that based on their descriptions I must listen to very soon.

Running GUI apps as root

It was noted that you can't really tell which GUI apps are running as root but one of the comments shared a somewhat subtle way to tell them apart, change root's coloring. If you run this command:
sudo "/Applications/System Preferences.app/Contents/MacOS/System Preferences"
you can set system preferences for root. To change the coloring, go to General and set the Appearance to Graphite and maybe change the Hightlight Color to something else as well. Doing this will make any GUI app running as root have different coloring on it's window elements (scroll bars, open, close minimize buttons, etc.) In something like a text editor, a differeent highlight color could be very noticable. I suppose changing root's language to Français would be pretty obvious too ;-)