Developing SGML DTDs: From Text To Model To Markup

Quite by accident, I discovered that Eve Maler and Jeanne El Andaloussi's Developing SGML DTDs: From Text To Model To Markup is available online. I'm one of the people lucky enough to own a hard copy, but if you aren't as fortunate, read it at http://www.xmlgrrl.com/publications/DSDTD/. It's one of the best books ever written about information analysis, that (far too) little used skill required to write a good DTD. In my ever-so humble opinion, the book should be mandatory for anyone involved in a markup-related project of any kind, that's how good it is.

(Yes, I know it was written before XML came out, 12 years ago, but XML is SGML, really, and the book remains as useful today as it was when it came out in 1995.S

Tiny URLs

I don't like them. Tiny URLs, that is. Those short things that look like web addresses (they are!) but give no clue to what their targets are. They have become commonplace enough now, though, and it's time to react.

I really don't like them.

Here's why: They look just like those little URLs that used to be well hidden in seemingly legitimate spam emails. Every time I see them, my first thought is spam. If I follow that link, someone will exploit a weakness in my browser to gain control over my machine or empty my credit card, somehow. And yes, I know, it won't really happen but I've lived with spam for a long time and I don't trust anything that cannot be deciphered simply by looking at it. I'm a bit silly in that respect. Yes, I realise there are benefits with using short URLs when tweeting, when your available space in counted in characters, but that's another instinctive dislike of mine: What's the point of messages forced to be short in such an arbitrary manner?

Yes, I use Twitter myself (mostly to keep track of stuff such as my favourite XML conference, XML Prague) and I fully understand the need of short URLs in tweets. You don't really want to waste the available space with a URL, if at all possible. It's a neat way of solving a problem, but a problem that is extremely artificial to begin with, to make room for other characters in an arbitrarily limited message.

But above all, I don't trust tiny URLs because I can't see what they are about. They are just characters preceded by "http://" and they look every bit as sneaky as that link you just know will break your machine.

Festival Impressions

The Göteborg Film Festival is over and life is slowly returning to normal. As usual I've worked at the festival as a projectionist (my 21st consecutive year at the Draken Cinema), screening films day and night, and the first few days after each festival are always a blur. First of all, I've had way too little sleep so my brain is not working at full speed. Second, the festival itself imposes a mental and physical routine that takes a few days to break. A day at the festival is divided into shows starting at certain times so everything I do is based on these fixed points in time; when I eat, when I have coffee, when I do anything but the screening itself.

And I'm not there yet. The last show was at 9 p.m. last night and mentally I'm still in the projection booth. I have still to say more than "hi" to my family, and I have no idea of what's been going on in the outside world, other than what I've learned through the Internet.

I expect the same to be true for many of my colleagues and probably quite a few festival visitors. The difference between me and most of them is that I don't watch films, I just screen them. The vast majority of the others visit and work at the festival because they love watching films. They see several of those every day, for 11 straight days, and then discuss them between themselves, finding new angles, new interpretations.

And sometimes they ask me about the films. Did I see anything good? Was the festival a success? Was this or that actor in film xyz? Etc. And I always tell them that I have no idea, that I didn't see a single film, that I don't care about what I show, just that it's shown as well as possible. I'm not there for the films, I'm there for the projection. It's a film projection marathon and I like the challenge. And every time, they are mystified. They look at me in disbelief, wondering why, wondering how I can spend 11 days in a dark projection booth, screening 60 shows without being interested in what I show.

It's the work itself, people. It's the technology, the projectors and the sound systems, but it's also the art, the show itself, with curtains and lights and magic; and it's the craftsmanship, inspecting film prints and handling the various requirements that together result in a successful show.

I explain this to people and they nod as if finally understanding... until the next time around, the next year and the next festival.

So yes, there might have been a few good films this year but I don't know that, and I really don't care. Was the festival successful? Yes, my screenings went well, all of them.

See you next year.

Five Days and Counting

The film festival is past the halfway mark now. And yes, I'm counting the hours.