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Guitarist Jeff Healey Dies at 41 – MSN Music News

Sad news.  Canuck guitarist Jeff Healey passed away. 

For more on this incredible artist, see his official web site and the wiki entry for more details on Jeff and his music.

“Guitarist and bandleader Jeff Healey dies in Toronto hospital

“Following a lengthy struggle with cancer,
Healey passes away on the eve of the
release of a new blues rock album

“Jeff Healey, arguably one of the most distinctive guitar players of our time, died today (Sunday March 2) in St. Joseph’s Hospital, Toronto. He was 41, and leaves his wife, Cristie, daughter Rachel (13) and son Derek (three), as well as his father and step-mother, Bud and Rose Healey, and sisters Laura and Linda.”

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Of interest: FastCompany’s Top 10 Web Sites You’ve Never Heard Of

Guarded nearly as well as the passcode to the Microsoft home of the future, and the details of the Inquisition were released this week (not to be confused with The Spanish Inquisition of Monty Python fame)… here are The Top 10 Web Sites You’ve Never Heard Of courtesy of Chris Dannen and April Joyner at FastCompany.com

“FastCompany.com has culled the most useful and entertaining sites from the far reaches of the Web so that when these sites go mainstream, you’ll be one step ahead of the crowd.

They are (with details excerpted from the site)…

CrazyBlindDate offers blind dates at public places in your neighborhood in New York; Austin, Texas; Boston; and San Francisco (with more cities coming soon). The authors said that this site is better than “pining over profile pictures on Facebook.”

DailyLit – The site offers both classic and contemporary titles, all provided in quick-reading installments that can be sent to you either via e-mail or RSS.

IWantSandy  Not good at remembering to print out your flight confirmation code? Send a message to Sandy, and she’ll remind you in a daily digest, in a text message or as an event on your calendar.

Cocktail Party Physics is Jennifer Ouelette’s blog about science and technology come to life as effortlessly as everyday chatter about politics, celebrities and vacations.

Newsmap is an amazing graphical representation of the constantly changing headlines on Google News. 

Run.com is a user-generated database of running routes all over the world, uses Google Maps mashups, allowing runners to look up routes in their area and choose them by length, difficulty, scenery and other user-rated criteria.

MakeUseOf – MakeUseOf is a tech blog that even laymen can understand…. in considerably de-geeked language.

5min — it’s a site featuring short videos that provide solutions or instructions for common and practical issues, like how to insulate your house or how to teach your dog to sit.

TryPhone – a fully functioning interactive phone-testing site where you walk through all the common features of the phone you’re considering buying in glorious, high-resolution interactivity.

Damn Interesting – a blog that writes long-form historical summaries of just about anything that’s, well … damn interesting.

Tags: Friday Link, humour, humor, websites.

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Leap year programming questions

I received two notes on this happy leap day that there was a problem someone was having in with accounting for leap years in their code.  Both were quickly solved.

The first was programming for a leap year that turned out to be a common problem.  The programmer was checking for leap year by dividing the year evenly by 4, and seeing an error when looking at historical transactions in 1900 and 2000.  Centennial leap years can only be evenly divided by 400.

The other was with the use of the ATL COleDateTime API related to handling leap years in Visual Studio and .NET Framework.  It turned out that the workaround referenced in this article on Connect solved the issue: http://connect.microsoft.com/VisualStudio/feedback/Workaround.aspx?FeedbackID=98949

Tags: leap year, Visual Studio.

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Of interest: Communications and Autism

Quick break between meetings… a link to this article in Wired this month, “The Truth About Autism: Scientists Reconsider What They Think They Know” By David Wolman  02.25.08  (excerpt below).

“The YouTube clip opens with a woman facing away from the camera, rocking back and forth, flapping her hands awkwardly, and emitting an eerie hum. She then performs strange repetitive behaviors: slapping a piece of paper against a window, running a hand lengthwise over a computer keyboard, twisting the knob of a drawer. She bats a necklace with her hand and nuzzles her face against the pages of a book. And you find yourself thinking: Who’s shooting this footage of the handicapped lady, and why do I always get sucked into watching the latest viral video?

“But then the words “A Translation” appear on a black screen, and for the next five minutes, 27-year-old Amanda Baggs — who is autistic and doesn’t speak — describes in vivid and articulate terms what’s going on inside her head as she carries out these seemingly bizarre actions. In a synthesized voice generated by a software application, she explains that touching, tasting, and smelling allow her to have a “constant conversation” with her surroundings. These forms of nonverbal stimuli constitute her “native language,” Baggs explains, and are no better or worse than spoken language. Yet her failure to speak is seen as a deficit, she says, while other people’s failure to learn her language is seen as natural and acceptable.

“And you find yourself thinking: She might have a point.”

Also see this post in the NYT blog which references the Wired article and provided me with a link to Baggs’ blog…

Links (in case the embedded ones don’t work for you)

Tags: communication, autism, Amanda Baggs, Wired.

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Of interest: Forbes coverage of the Microsoft-Yahoo! saga

Forbes offers the The Yahoo! Deal coverage on Microsoft’s bid for Yahoo!.

“Analysis in text and video by forbes editors and writers and industry experts: www.forbes.com/yahoodeal.”