links for 2009-09-20

"mPDF is a PHP class which generates PDF files from UTF-8 encoded HTML. It is based on FPDF, HTML2FPDF, and UFPDF, with a number of enhancements."

"Maintained correctly, your blog is the one tool that will get you the most traffic, and it’s the tool over which you have the most control. If you set out with the intention of posting three to five times per week, within a year, you will begin seeing significant activity around your site. Within two to three years, you could easily be an authority in your particular niche." I need to work on this.

"FANCY a three-day weekend – not just once in a while but week in week out? You may think your bosses would never agree to it, but the evidence suggests that employers, employees and the environment all benefit." I totally vote for it.

"Three men have been arrested in connection with an alleged plot to launch an attack in the United States, the US Justice Department says. The men are accused of making false statements related to "a matter involving international and domestic terrorism", the statement said. US media have reported that the investigation was focusing on a possible plan to attack a public area in New York. "

A nerd is at the center of intelligence, social ineptitude and obsession.

"US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates has rejected the claim that a decision to shelve a plan for missile defence in Europe was a concession to Russia. A new system will be able to provide such a defence sooner and more effectively, he said. But he said the system, designed to deal with long-range missiles, would not have been installed before 2017, and that a new system announced by President Obama this week would provide better protection."

"The Justice Department said that while the agreement would provide many benefits to the public, it also raised significant issues regarding class-action, copyright and antitrust law."

"A Fox News Channel producer has been caught in a behind-the-scenes video rallying the crowd during last weekend's 9/12 protest in Washington." Way to maintain that journalistic integrity.

"Fighting in Yemen is reported to be continuing despite a conditional ceasefire called by the government in its conflict with northern Shia rebels."

"Usability has long been the redheaded stepchild of software design. It's a shame, but it's easy to see why. Faced with the growing complexity of OS platforms, languages, protocols, and standards, programmers tend to focus on issues like algorithm design, abstraction, and code reuse first, UI second. They design unit tests to verify each feature in isolation before they ever look at the big picture. Simply put, if most custom application UIs look like they were designed by teams of engineers, it's because they were." I agree.

"A multiselect widget for mootools."

"So here’s where we stand. Bank of America is unwilling to do a loan modification, despite having taken billions of dollars in TARP funding, which was supposed to go towards loan modifications. They would prefer to demand completely unrealistic payments and force repossession/eviction on a family than to adjust to the reality of the American economy, even temporarily. Forcing the eviction and repossession will give them an asset of negligible value, compared to the over-time benefit of the loan modification. They are happy to rely on bullying, scare tactics, and brutality, and seem to feel that they can crush people at will. Point being, in moving directly to repossess without notice, Bank of America is in violation of several laws, and in the way they addressed me, they’re in violation of several others." This is a real horror story.

"Fundamentally, US immigration policy is a complete nightmare. All the vested interests, all the religious/social/conservative arguments, all the animosity, it's all a nightmare. And it's much more the third-rail of US politics than even health care or social security. Even though the Shrub had massive majorities in both houses of congress, he still couldn't push through even the most minor (to me) immigration reforms. What hope do a bunch of VCs have?" Stop regulating moral issues.

"The proliferation of personal computers, iPods, cellphones, game consoles and all the rest amounts to the fastest-growing source of power demand in the world. Americans now have about 25 consumer electronic products in every household, compared with just three in 1980." Crazy.

"The company sends out 16.5 million invoices each month, but the accelerated rate of signups in August made it possible to imagine converting the entire customer base to paperless in only 15 months — and fully realize the potential annual savings of 10.8 million pounds of paper, equivalent to 13,500 trees (T-Mobile will talk only of trees to be saved, not dollars)." I'm totally paperless, or as much as I can be.

"The world's first ant colony to achieve sentience calls off the search for us."

"Technically, this endorsement does not have to say anything about the future prospects of the tags in Microsoft products, let alone the method Microsoft will choose. Most likely, the company will opt to go the Apple way, and use the DirectShow/Media Foundation frameworks." Well some decent news.

"Fifteen years after Jeffrey P. Bezos founded the company as an online bookstore, Amazon is set to cross a significant threshold. Sometime later this year, if current trends continue, worldwide sales of media products — the books, movies and music that Amazon started with — will be surpassed for the first time by sales of other merchandise on the site. (That transition already occurred this year in its North American business.)" Amazon is already my online Wal-Mart.

"French President Nicolas Sarkozy will urge fellow G20 leaders to introduce a special tax to reduce risky behaviour by banks, the BBC has learned. Mr Sarkozy wants a levy known as a Tobin Tax to be applied to every financial transaction. The move is aimed at cutting excessively speculative trades and encouraging long-term decision-making. But senior EU officials told the BBC that the chances of getting a global agreement were "less than minimal"." Doesn't seem like the right idea.