Friday 28 December 2012

XML Prague 2013

Somewhat surprisingly, the XML Prague 2013 paper I mentioned in an earlier post was accepted. Considering how little time I had to write it ("writing" is probably a bit of a stretch, "drafting" is more to the point), I have to say I'm extremely pleased. I'm very much looking forward to presenting it.

I'm going to talk about the eXist-based publishing solution I've been busy doing for a client. It began as a humble PDF-on-demand service but came to include a lot of stuff I find cool in and slightly outside the world of XML. There's XProc, XQuery, RelaxNG, the process XML abstraction I have been working on, XML authoring, nightly mirroring from SQL databases to eXist, and more. And it all seems to come together quite well. I've had fun working with all this so I'm hoping it might be of interest to others, too.

XML Prague, of course, is worth a visit regardless. Think of it as an XML weekend about cool new things frequently starting with an "X", interesting people, Czech hospitality (including Czech beer), and one of my favourite cities, Prague.

Sunday 25 November 2012

XML Prague Whitepaper Woes

Why is it that every year, I promise myself to finish my (XML Prague and otherwise) whitepapers early in order to avoid spending the last few nights before a deadline writing furiously but always end up doing just that, very frequently having to share whatever little time that remains with customer projects, family engagements and various Christmas preparations, seeing that yes, Christmas arrives at around the same time this year as every other?

Wednesday 14 November 2012

Eye Surgery

Title says it all. They moved a muscle back to where it's supposed to be. Some childhood operation to fix a squinting eye had resulted in it sliding back to where it was mostly useless.

Ouch.

Wednesday 7 November 2012

Processing XML with Process XML

I presented my ideas on processing XML using XML at Balisage, earlier this year. While there I actually demo'd converting my Process XML draft to a FreeMind-based user interface at the MarkLogic-sponsored demo jam. Well, it wasn't as much a user interface as it was a representation of the XML that might be used to create a user interface with, but it was a start and today I've finally taken it a few steps further.

Um, that's not exactly true either. I've worked on my Process XML some more during the last few weeks, because I'm using it for a customer project. What started out as a DTD is now a RelaxNG compact schema that uses xml:base to ease processing, covers most of the current Calabash version (1.0.3-94, as I write this), and is actually useful.

But today I wrote "live" Process XML, XSLT and pipelines that will make it a reality. The GUI will not happen for some time yet, because there is no need for one in the current implementation, but it's going to be used for describing various XML-related processes that include XProc pipelines on an ​eXist​ server handling on-demand publishing.

And it's very cool.

Thursday 25 October 2012

I'm Big in Alaska

According to Google's stats, I'm big in Alaska. Well, comparatively. That part of the map was greener than most.

Tuesday 23 October 2012

eXistential Issues

I've been toying with eXist with increasing fascination, lately. I've even been wishing I was more of a programmer, reading up on http, REST, and other stuff somewhat related to running an XML database on the web. I've been actively trying to find out what server(s) to use to run my blog in parallel to an eXist setup.

It's got to be some kind of crisis and I am going to seek help.

Friday 28 September 2012

Topic-based

I recently held a two-day workshop on topic-based information for a client faced with moving from paper-based documentation to multiple outputs in multiple media, especially in "smartphones". Now, before drawing conclusions, you should know that this particular client does have a reasonably mature process supported by a reasonably mature system. They already produce in XML, they translate their content to multiple languages, and they already publish automatically.

Their information is very much "book-oriented", however. It's sequential and it has interdependencies all over the documentation.

They were suggested "topic-based information" as means to an end, and my task, therefore, became to educate them about what is meant by topic-based information, what the intended advantages and frequent challenges are, what standards there are out there to support the concepts, and how it alls relates to their situation today. And of course, I needed to tell them about DITA because while DITA equals neither topic-based nor multi-channel publishing per se, it has become something of a de facto standard for topic-based information and there is a lot to be learned from it.

I remained largely neutral concerning DITA throughout the workshops, but nevertheless, I was forced to reconsider and, in some cases, re-evaluate some of my opinions. DITA is what it is, it is widespread and it is constantly being developed, and it cannot be ignored if discussing topic-based information solutions.

Take the strict topic orientation as a primitive example. One task, one topic. No dependencies, no context or hierarchy linking the topic to others from within the topic itself, no broken cross-references, et cetera. I have frequently dismissed parts of this as the inevitable consequences of ill-designed systems, but as I was highlighting practical examples from my client's current information, I did see the value of the concept of a single, isolated task beyond mere system limitations. See, while a system does help if implemented properly, any dependencies in the information will nevertheless make it more difficult to maintain and update if used in several different contexts. I could clearly see this happen with my client's documentation, and while I'm not at liberty to discuss any specifics, theirs was a very good case for minimalism.

More obvious, perhaps, were the strategies implied by DITA concerning online documentation. If publishing for a smartphone, for example, it is obvious that size does matter. There is no room for large overviews or tables, nor is there a place for long narratives. There is no way to know how the reader arrived at the current topic so there is no way to give that narrative, or a longer list of contents or a list of related topics that aren't essential but nice to have, etc. There are obvious implications on large content, including eliminating those pesky overviews, but also on how to present single, self-sufficient topics.

You have to make every such topic completely independent from the next or the previous ones, because there is no way to know what the next or previous ones were about. The limited space needs to focus on solving the task at hand so giving references and links is tricky at best.

As the topic is included in a publication later on, in DITA maps, and always in a specific context, the target format is only known when creating the publication, and therefore DITA maps are the logical place to include any such references in. Maps provide a logical place to address anything context-related, including hierarchies, references, etc.

DITA is certainly not the only way to achieve strict topic orientation, but it is relatively unique in offering a comprehensive method for achieving it, including minimalist concepts, online documentation requirements, etc, in one place. One could argue the merits of something like S1000D for purpose-filled topical documentation, but while S1000D is many things, I doubt it will ever be accused of minimalism. And these days, DITA is expanding outside its original box within software documentation and, increasingly, solving problems in new domains.

DITA brings with it a number of challenges (that's the same as "problems" but in presales-speak), of which many have to do with how to restore some of the inherent readability of sequential content meant for paper-based books, and I remain unconvinced in this regard. Markup-wise, the DTD leaves room for improvement, and I think there are better ways to design linking mechanisms (even though DITA includes some clever ID-related tricks). I think specialisation suffers because the original DTD suffers, and I think DITA struggles when it comes to profiling information.

But just as DITA is not the only XML-related standard to offer topic orientation and reuse, it is not the only one with problems. It is perhaps too easy for a grumpy old XML guy like me to dismiss DITA because I find problems in its execution, because there is a lot of good things in it, too, and this blog entry is my way of saying that I am reconsidering.

Who says you can't teach old dogs new tricks? Next I'll be embracing Java.

Sunday 23 September 2012

Jaguar Meetup

Went to a Jaguar meetup today. For those of you not in the know, the meetups are mostly about middle-aged men looking under the hoods of each other's cars and occasionally about hot dogs and Cokes, but always very much about enthusiasts. They are about confirmation, about you not being alone in at least one of your obsessions, and about venerable British cars of which some are modern and reliable but most, um, charming.

In short, if you don't know what I'm on about, skip to the next blog. Actually, skip to the next one anyway because I'm done for now.

Thursday 6 September 2012

Going to Do DITA

I have a new client and I'm going to do DITA and topic-based information for them. For some reason, all I can think of is Al Pacino and that memorable scene in Godfather III, "just when I thought I was out, they pull me back in."

Tuesday 4 September 2012

Steve Jobs Is Guilty

Writing this on my daughter's MacBook. Um, actually it's mine. I'm in need of a new laptop and she's got a newer MacBook now, and this was the most economical solution, all things considered.

I have to say I rather like it.

Friday 31 August 2012

Top Gear and Nearing 50

Watching an old episode of Top Gear on BBC as I write this. Currently, James May is racing two twentysomethings, driving a Peueot 207. The twentysomethings are running, jumping over cars, buildings, that sort of thing, while Captain Slow is following the Liverpool roads. Typical Top Gear, I'd say.

Now, my daughter says I'm old. Age-old, in fact, long past the age when I understood even the slightest bit about anyone in her generation. Me watching Top Gear is all the proof anyone would ever need, she says. It's a old man's show but also a geek's show, and of no interest whatsoever.

I was rooting for Captain Slow right from the start. Young kids in funny clothes jumping from roofs? Oh please. Some dignity, please. And, for pete's sake, they are racing a car. Even Captain Slow can't lose that.

Right?

During the challenge (that's what they call it), it struck me that I may be choosing sides because of my age. It's a case of identification. May is roughly my age while the kids in funny clothes are probably more than 20 years younger. What if mine really isn't the only possible vantage point? What if someone, oh, I don't know, a younger person, would quite naturally hope the kids won? What if there was a TV series focussing on the kids and the grumpy old men were there to provide the stars with a challenge, not the other way around?

The kids won. Thankfully there's always another episode to look forward to.

Thursday 30 August 2012

Writing Copy

I've been busy writing commercial copy for our service and product portfolio. This is very hard. How does one express the advantages of our rather technical offerings without resorting to empty clichés and, frankly speaking, an unidentifiable product?

Unidentifiable? Well, yes, because at the core, the content management system we develop is far from being unique when described in market-speak. Nor are our services so different from those offered by our competitors when one is only allowed a bird's view, and a stratospheric bird's at that. Whatever our advantages, they start on a purely technical level and any explanation that won't immediately put the casual observer to sleep will, at best, be so superficial it borders on generic and therefore not unique.

This is why I don't usually write marketing copy. While I've often claimed not to be a programmer, I am certainly not a copywriter. I don't do the kind of head-first marketing that shamelessly exploits one cliché after another and claims everything to be either my invention or my company's, and, of course, bigger than, oh, I dunno, teh interwebz.

Because someone will always see right through you. In my case, it might well be someone I know.

Buy our products. They are awesome.

Monday 27 August 2012

Balisage Impressions, At Long Last

I tend to write these "long time no post" posts from time to time. It's a guilt thing, I suppose, and it's how this post began life.

This time, though, I did have things to write about. There is the Balisage 2012 markup conference I attended two weeks ago, and it would be such a waste not to post something on it. I gave a paper there, my little something on how to implement XProc with more XML, and I even participated in MarkLogic's demo jam with even more of the same. Great fun, that.

The most fun I had at Balisage had to do with listening to others give papers, however, with special mention having to go to Wendell Piez's talk about how to process LMNL (non-XML) markup. LMNL is all about overlapping structures, the kind of thing that XML just won't do, and it's absolutely awesome. For some reason I've not given the overlap problem (or, for that matter, the related problem with discontinuous structures) much thought lately. I should have. LMNL, it seems to me, should be very useful for analysing dead languages such as Middle Egyptian where overlapping markup could be used to present alternative interpretations for grammar, pronunciation, and so on. There's a paper begging to be written, right there. Next year, maybe.

It is good sometimes to remember that XML is not the answer to everything.

But there was more, a lot more. There were some excellent presenters, such as Steven Pemberton discussing abstraction errors (among others, in the C language), Norm Walsh with his compact XProc syntax proposal, and, of course, the undisputed king of keynotes, Michael Sperberg-McQueen, who, as Eric van der Vlist tweeted, "has a special gift to make each presenter feel clever in his closing keynotes." And so many others.

And I really should mention Betty Harvey's talk about implementing low-cost electronic documentation for a DoD contractor. In glorious SGML. I love history lessons, especially in my chosen field, and Betty's was a stroll down memory lane.

Anyway, Balisage was fun and you really should have been there. Or maybe not if you aren't into markup, but if so, why are you still reading this?

Thursday 5 July 2012

Early Submission

I submitted the final version of my Balisage paper yesterday, no less than nine days before deadline. It felt good but also quite odd; my usual MO is to edit until the last possible moment before submitting, checking and rechecking, editing and re-editing.

Wednesday 27 June 2012

Review Angst

The Balisage paper acceptance email I got a few weeks ago contained not only the good news and some practical information with deadlines and such, but also peer review comments. When I first opened the email, I consciously avoided reading the comments, instead enjoying the moment and wondering about practicalities. I thought I'd start revising later; there was, after all, plenty of time.

A week went by and while I did think about ways to improve my paper, especially what examples and code to include in the presentation, I did not read the comments. After the second week, most of which I spent busy in customer projects, I still had not read the comments. Yes, I did think about my paper and I did take care of the practicalities, from passport to registration to hotel room reservation to booking flights, but I did not read a single comment.

It then dawned on me that my unconscious was hard at work avoiding them.

Peer reviews are the kind of feedback I tend to care about, and care about a lot. They are the exact opposite of your mum complimenting on your doodles on paper ("very nice, dear"), because they are written by people who a) know the field and b) want to understand what I'm trying to say, but also c) attempt to determine the validity of my ideas. Effectively, d) they decide my fate, not just the paper's.

Sounds dramatic, right? It is, because I care very much about what I do, and I'd like to think that my ideas are worthwhile, that they add something. In my mind, the acceptance of the paper itself is secondary; it is instead vitally important that what thepaper represents is accepted, that the ideas are sound. Make sense?

Yet, paradoxically, when using those same ideas in my work I'm self-confident and usually will have a pretty good idea of what works and what doesn't. I'm not particularly sensitive about them and will change them if needed, without bruising my ego too badly. It's natural for ideas to evolve and to change; it's natural to adapt.

Why are peer reviews different?

By the way, I did read the comments, eventually, and survived. They were quite useful, actually, and entertaining, too.

Tuesday 12 June 2012

The Final (?) Take on Film Markup Language

As some of you may know, I sometimes project films at the Draken cinema when I'm not busy doing XML stuff. Also, as I've noted before, film projection is moving from analogue to digital and it's all happening very, very fast. The commercial cinemas, multiplexes all of them, now run films on hot-swap hard drives in servers coupled with ugly digital projectors, and the one remaining 35mm cinema, an art house, is rumoured to close soon.

So today, after a call from the city council's school cinema group, I started thinking and realised that while I did consider the advent of all things digital when I first wrote Film Markup Language, even updating the DTD to include some rudimentary support for 2k and 4k projection for my 2010 presentation on it in Prague, it's too late to actually modernise the DTD or the spec for what's actually going on today.

See, the digital thingies do use XML. It's inconsistent and looks like some weird kind of committee hack, though, the kind of XML you might find in Java config files, but it's XML and it seems to be enough. So, Film Markup Language is dead for all practical purposes.

It's kind of sad.

Book on XLink?!

I didn't know there was a book on XLink so imagine my surprise when I found this. But more importantly, imagine my surprise when I saw the publication date:

24 Jun 1987

Monday 28 May 2012

Balisage 2012

I'll be presenting a paper at Balisage 2012 in Montréal, Canada, in August. For those of you who have no idea of what I'm talking about, Balisage is is a conference on markup, a sister conference to XML Prague, and, together with the latter, a markup geek's wet dream. The conference is not just about XML (although quite naturally, XML takes up a lot of space), there are all kinds of topics related to markup theory and practice, including all those semantics you really can't formalise using XML.

Balisage, along with XML Prague, is also a conference where the discussions that inevitably follow the presentations are actually on topic and intelligent. It's a very humbling experience to stand before a crowd of experts that can and will spot any flaws you might have in your slides, suggest improvements you never thought of and generally offer valuable insights. It's a forum for learning, whether you are a presenter or a part of the audience.

I'm really, really looking forward to August.

Friday 4 May 2012

Peer Reviews

I've been peer reviewing for an XML conference, lately, and I just have to say that this markup thing doesn't seem to be a passing fad.

Seriously, after 15+ years in the field, it still amazes me how useful it can be. Markup practitioners are a creative bunch, and more often than not, peer reviewing is a very humbling experience. There's so much I want to (need to) learn more about, so many technologies to try, and so little time.

I should probably post this and go back to experimenting with XQuery.

Monday 26 March 2012

Query vs Change

My friend and fellow XML geek Erik Siegel writes about marketing XML databases in his latest blog post. Basically, Erik says that XML database vendors aren't doing themselves any favours by marketing their products simply as databases in the strictest definition of the word, that is, places for storing, indexing and querying data that happens to be XML, instead of bringing forward other relevant points having to do with processing the XML with other cool standards that all begin with the letter X.

I'm not going to argue the points he makes - they are perfectly valid and I agree with them - but one phrase in his list of XML database features struck a chord with me:
Processing Engine: On top of this data storage is always a processing engine. This engine can run XQuery programs for querying and manipulating the database. Besides XQuery it usually implements other X languages like XSLT, XProc, XInclude, Schema validations and the likes.
The emphasis is mine.

Manipulating, to me, means changing in some way. In other words, manipulating as opposed to querying. You may think I'm arguing semantics, especially considering that it's what you do with XQuery in an XML database. You query and you manipulate.

Problem is, for me, a database is all about storage, it's all about storing my data reliably. Yes, they all add functionality for all kinds of stuff, from queries to, well, manipulation, but to me, the focus is on reliable storage. If I store my data there, I want to know for certain that I can retrieve that same data three years later. I don't want to query and manipulate my data; I want to query my data and then do stuff with the data outside the storage area, if that makes sense.

That, of course, is where version handling comes in. If you manipulate data, you change it. But if you want to (reliably) store your old data, you first make a copy, then change the copy and store that, preferably linking the two versions with each other in some nifty manner, so that you'll know that they are related to each other, three years later.

Of course, that's quite a bit more functionality than that simple database for, erm, queries and manipulation, but to me, reliable versioning is what really makes them useful. Without it, I'd be constantly worried about my XQuery skills, which, I have to admit, could be better.

Friday 23 March 2012

Enthusiasts

A few years ago, I decided to pursue a dream. Instead of upgrading my sensible Volvo V70 to another sensible Volvo, I bought a Jaguar. Not one of the really fancy ones but nevertheless a real Jaguar, with a V8 engine that is capable of 300 bhp and enough speed for the Autobahn. It's a 2003 S-Type and one of my most precious possessions.

It's a thing of beauty. It has beautiful lines and an elegant interior with Jaguar's trademark wooden panels and charcoal-coloured leather. The equipment & accessories level is fabulous, with everything from electric seats and auto-dimming rearview mirrors to an integrated satnav and a built-in phone. And it's made for the driver; the whole experience is geared towards the person behind the wheel, fine-tuned for long road trips.

Not that it isn't practical enough for a family man like that sensible Volvo would have been; it is. There is enough room for the four of us in my family, should we decide to travel in style, and it's actually not al that expensive to drive if you stay away from the Sport button. The, shall we say, reputable British electrical system is more reliable than, well, its reputation, and the build quality is superior.

Should something break down, though, spare parts aren't more expensive than the sensible Volvo's, but the situation can nevertheless be tricky. See, you don't want every Tom, Dick or Harry at a Volvo shop to touch your Jag. A Volvo is one thing - it's means to an end, really, nothing more - but a Jag something else altogether. It's a priced possession and therefore cannot be left at the mercy of a time-slotted teenager at Volvo.

Which brings me to the subject of enthusiasts. I was lucky. First of all, I realised that I wanted to by my Jag from somebody who knows Jags, so I found Joe's Garage, a Lund, Sweden operation specialising in Jags. Nice and knowledgeable, they can also locate just the right car for you, should you not be satisfied with their current offerings. My S-Type was imported from Germany by them and then brought up to specs at their repair shop. And while I waited for the paperwork to complete in Lund, I couldn't help but notice the lid at the loo, boasting the Union Jack.

In fact, British colours were everywhere. Flags, coffee mugs, lounge paint... not to mention the twin-deck bus outside. The people at Joe's Garage are die-hard enthusiasts and anglophiles. I'm too, so it's a perfect match. Well, almost.

Servicing your new Jag at a shop a three-hour drive from home is cumbersome at best, so I was given the number to JaguarLars, a Gothenburg-based Jaguar shop named after its owner, a Jaguar enthusiast possibly even more fanatic than his peers in Lund. A former IT consultant, Lars realised a long time ago that he'd be far happier servicing, selling and buying Jaguars than sitting at a keyboard, and therefore set up a shop that only deals with Jaguars (well, actually he does currently have an Aston Martin DB7 on sale, but...). He knows everything about Jags, is always willing to spend a few minutes chatting about Jags, Top Gear and more, and- if you're lucky - will let you borrow his XJS while fixing yours.

And that's the thing; with buying Jaguars comes the territory. No, not the British gentleman in tweed or his yearly fox hunt, but the enthusiasts who are into Jaguars for a reason entirely different from what you explain to the bank when buying that sensible Volvo. Yes, you frequently drive to and from work with it, drop off your kid at figure skating training, or take it to the grocery shop, but you do it in style and with a smile.

The world can never be the same again.

Tuesday 21 February 2012

Ebooks and Apple

Just read Apple's rather restrictive DRM clauses for budding ebook authors. Now, while I understand that Apple will want to make money if an author uses their services to make money, what I don't understand is why anyone would accept that these services should be the only ones the author was allowed to use.

What if Microsoft had decided that you can only publish a book written using Microsoft Word through Microsoft? Do you think Word would have survived? Do you think books would have?

What if you write your ebook using Apple's brave new software, submit it to them, and they reject it? Your book is going to be unusable because the tool and the format are both proprietary, and you will essentially have to recreate everything using some other tool, most likely one with very different features.

And that could happen very easily, considering how restrictive the people at Apple are regarding allowable content. Want to make a political satire? Forget it. Explicit, adult-only content? Forget it. A book exposing worker's situation at electronics factories in China? Forget it. There is censorship at Apple, yet they want to take over  the publishing industry.

I'm all for new and exciting formats and ways to publish, but I cannot support something that essentially monopolises content creation and publishing.

Moving to Digital

With most surviving cinemas rapidly going digital, a lot of perfectly good film projection and cinema sound equipment is being replaced with their all-digital counterparts. It's to be expected, of course, but what most people don't realise is that the new technology is not yet even close to the old one in terms of quality.

A 35mm film strip, so far, is superior to the digital technology in just about every respect, from resolution to contrast to colours. Yes, you will hear a lot of hype from the industry about scratch-free and dust-free images, HD and the perceived (low) line density of 35mm answer prints, much like the music industry once hyped the compact disc, but I suggest you to trust your eyes instead.

If you are lucky enough to have an art house in your area, go see an old movie, preferably something from the fifties, filmed in Technicolor and Vista Vision. A lot of the old westerns were filmed using these technologies, as were some Hitchcock thrillers; you should be able to find one. Then buy a ticket to your nearest multiplex with the latest in digital technology and see for yourself.

Now, I'm betting that you'll find the latter scratch-free and dust-free, but I'm also betting that you'll find the former alive in a sense that just cannot be done today.

I talked to a cinematographer during the last Göteborg Film Festival a few weeks ago. He was responsible for the cinematography of the opening feature and understandably anxious about every aspect of film projection before the first show. They had shot the film using digital cameras and we, of course, had just installed the latest in digital projection technology. I thought he would be pleased. Yet, the film production crew was very anxious to screen a 35mm print of the film, rather than a digital copy.

Why?

Well, the cinematographer told me that they had added grain to the digital print using a computerised process. This was done in order to simulate the grain inherent in a 35mm print and make the film look more natural and alive, but the problem was that the image was still dead in a way that could never happen on film, not even when the image had been transferred from a digital original.

I screened the 35mm print, of course, and everyone was happy. What's really interesting, though, is that several other film-makers approached me and the festival with similar opinions and requests. If a 35mm print was available, they much preferred it to a digital copy on a hard disk. Some went to the trouble of producing a 35mm print for the festival only.

Which means, of course, that while film-makers may still consider 35mm superior and make a print for film festivals only, what the audiences now have to get used to is digital technology. They do it to save money, of course. It costs a fortune to make and distribute heavy 35mm prints, requiring skilled projectionists at cinemas instead of low-level ushers clicking on Play.
Not only will the quality be lower but the risk of something going wrong without anyone in the cinema being able to fix the problem will be higher.

Me, I think that this will eventually marginalise cinemas, because that same quality of presentation can be achieved at home, but with the added bonuses of Fast Forward and Pause buttons, cold beverages from the fridge and the ability to share that digital image with others.

What do you think?

Thursday 16 February 2012

Back from XML Prague

I'm back from this year's edition of XML Prague, my favourite markup geek event. As always, there's plenty to praise, from Jeni Tennison's opening keynote to Michael Sperberg-McQueen's closing one and pretty much everything in between, from the friendly organisers to MarkLogic's demojam event at the social dinner, the city itself, and, well, everyhting.

But what really gives me my yearly high is the fact that the event is always so much more than simply the sum of the above. We get to interact and learn from fellow markup enthusiasts, we meet with some of our favourite tool producers (who also are markup enthusiasts, btw) and other pros in the field, and we are once again refuelled and energised and inspired, and ready to do more when back home. Every year.

Don't you think that's amazing?

Monday 23 January 2012

I Lost

Or won, depending on who you ask. I sales person called me the other day and said that it was time to renew my mobile subscription and data plan. Well, he wasn't quite as obvious about it but as a gadget geek I'm rather susceptible and my immediate question was "what kind of phones can you offer me as a part of the deal?"

"What kind of phone do you want?" was his reply.

I thought about it and realised that I want to try an iPhone. Yes, I know, you can't get anything more locked down than an Apple product, but I tried my daughter's and liked it. The interface leaves the HTC Desire's far behind and I think the alternative I've been thinking about, the Samsung Galaxy, feels like a fragile piece of plastic. And I've already tried a couple of other Android devices (including my work phone, the Sony Ericsson Xperia Mini Pro, that is the worst phone I've ever had the misfortune to use) but no iOS one.

So an iPhone 4S it is, for me. It's supposed to arrive today or tomorrow.

Saturday 21 January 2012

Digital Movie Subtitles and XSLT

Turns out that digital movie subtitles are kept in an XML file. There's time code, a couple of font elements, and there's a subtitle element that contains the text. ghastly, but I suppose it works.

Well, most of the time. Something had happened with the English subtitles to the festival opening feature, Avalon. A test run revealed that every subtitle was included twice, one set with Font Id "Arial" and another with font Id "Arial0".

Fixed this with an XSLT script, marking the first time I've used XSLT in my work as a projectionist.

Friday 20 January 2012

Digital Shows, FML and XML

Ran my second DCP show at Draken, earlier. The film is stored and handled by a Dolby server running a modified Debian Linux with XCF as the window manager producing a lightweight interface with only the bare necessities, but very, very functional necessities. There is drag and drop to handle show components, there are ready-made cues, and it's all reasonably well designed. Every time I use the touchpad/keyboard combo to build or run a show, I'm struck by how similar to my Film Markup Language concepts everything is. I presented my ideas at XML Prague in 2010 but after that, I couldn't make much headway with the hardware so the project sort of died.

Supposedly, the shows are indeed handled using XML files. I was planning something very much like Dolby's interface so I'm dying to know if their XML is anything like my DTD. The components are all there so I'm half hoping it is. I bet they don't use XLink, though.

Digital Images

Draken, the home of the Göteborg International Film Festival and my frequent point of existence, finally got a digital Barco projector and a Dolby server for handling digital features. As you may or may not know, cinemas around the world are moving to digital images while industry icons such as Kodak are crumbling, and in a matter of months or perhaps a year or two, 35mm film projection will only happen in film archives and art houses.

And, perhaps, film festivals. As I write this, only a week remains to the opening night of the 35th annual Göteborg International Film Festival, and at least half of the features I will screen there will be in DCP format. Yesterday, I ran my first all-digital show with the new equipment and today will be the second.

To people like me, this feels like the end. I'm hoping it's not but I can't help thinking that as a projectionist, I now belong to the museum together with the 35mm projectors and old cinema sound processors.

Tuesday 10 January 2012

HTC Desire

I've been using my daughter's HTC Desire, now that she's moved up in the world, to an iPhone. I have to say, the Desire is a significant step up from my previous mobile, the Nokia N900.

Don't get me wrong, the N900 is a fabulous device. It's not a mobile at all, really, it's a Debian Linux box that happens to have some phone functionality built in, the ultimate geek toy for the smartphone age. The hardware is superb and the software could have been amazing, had it not been for the fact that Nokia abandoned the product and its users twice (first, by moving from the Maemo OS to Meego and then from Meego to Windows Mobile). It's a supplier error and what could have been a great, great product became another footnote in communications history.

For this reason, I will not buy a Nokia again, not because they don't know how to make phones because they do, but because who knows when they'll decide to abandon their customers again?

The Desire, according to my daughter who knows all about this stuff, is an old phone. It's OK but seriously uncool and nothing when compared to an iPhone. Not knowing better, I think the Desire is user-friendly to a degree that I haven't witnessed in a while. Also, I'm not really an app kind of person, but there are enough of them available to keep me busy for a while.