I have released a beta of fPic – on the RB-NUG and [unofficial] RB/FR lists and on RB Garage. Some feedback already from the French side of the programmosphere – despite the language barrier, as the docs are in English. We’ll see. I am to hand over an article – like three months late – that will tie in nicely, as it is the second part of Pictures and Dynamic Libraries: a poor man’s plugin, which introduces the basics of fPics. The second part will delve deeper in the mechanics of linking C code and RB code in an OOP fashion – hopefully.

From the docs:

fPic is a two-part project aiming at providing a replacement Picture class for command-line applications [which notoriously lack any graphic capabilities]. I say two-part because it is split into a dynamic library [manip.dylib] and an RB class, fPic. The dylib handles the heavy-lifting, while the fPic class provides a [more or less] seamless way for RB programmers to manipulate images in CLI applications. I hope to be able, in the end, to produce a library that will have zero dependencies, or at least zero exotic ones (like things usually installed via Fink), but for the moment, some things are necessary, as doing without them would either cripple fPic, or make it too hard to build from the get-go.

And of course, this is a Mac OS X only library. I am planning to make a Linux version, some day, when the Mac version is stabilized. The Linux version, however, would have fewer functionalities, as I can’t use the Accelerate [FreeRotate, ContrastStretch and Equalize] and CoreGraphics [PDF files] frameworks there.

I have provided a few sample programmes, which show some of the things that can be done:

* fPicTester
fPicTester showcases some of the capabilities of fPic. It requires the images included in the distribution folder. The resulting image, Result,jpg, is opened in Preview.

* jpeger
jpeger is a small utility that takes a file image, a destination folder or filename, and some options, and converts the source image to a JPEG image. On success, if only one page was converted [in the case of PDF files, you may request one or more pages], the converted JPEG is opened in Preview.

* OnDemandPDF
This is a combination of a command-line app and some PHP. Put this folder inside ~/Sites/ so that it is accessible from your localhost [you’ll need Apache and PHP up and running of course]. Put some PDFs inside the docs subfolder, and access it from your favourite browser:

http://localhost/~yourNick/OnDemandPDF/
Click on one of the links, to view a document, and read it “online”.

This is a very early beta version, although I do use it myself in a couple of projects, so far without major problems. There are issues yet to be solved, see the docs included in the distribution, and feedback would be appreciated.

You can get the current beta here

Me thinks not. Lessee:

• 11: my passport is my only ID. Better have it with me…
• 10: Sure. Changi. Clean, well organized, orderly.
• 9: I even pretend *not* to be French when seating next to a Frenchman. Is that autistic enough?
• 8: Never happened so far…
• 7: Heh, only 6?
  Une bière, s’il vous plaît !
  Een bier, alstublieft!
  ナマビール一本下さい！
  A pint of the brown stuff, guv’
  생맥주 한 잔 주세요.
  Ein Bier, bitte!
  Una birra por favore.
  Una cerveza por favor
• 6: You don’t really want me to prove it, right?
• 5: How about a month’s worth? I’ll try and dig a photo. But nobody said anything about wrinkles, right?
• 4: Takes too much space. See commandment #5…
• 3: A former passport had a DDR, aka East Germany, visa. That’s a generation ago. Does it count?
• 2: don’t laugh, this is going to happen to me for the first time since, oh, last century?, in a fortnight…
• 1: Well, this could be the problem. Leaving terra firma means leaving my wife, my ADSL connection, my wine cellar, which contribute a lot to my well-being and business. On the other hand, I do most of my business after travelling to other parts of the world…

Then again, I only fly SkyTeam companies

De Telegraaf: Reputatie Nederland slecht. The (short and biased) article talks about how the Netherlands have a bad reputation abroad. Roughly translated, it starts with: “The Netherlands are a country of milk and honey, of windmills, wooden shoes, moats and art. Or are they? Coffeeshops, prostitution, abortion and crime are at least as well-known abroad.” Followed by the opinion of one (!) person who is ashamed of his country’s reputation, because everybody he talked to in the US associated the Netherlands with drugs.

Efectos Especiales

Well, I guess that’s the point of a reputation: you are *reputed* to be such and such. Nothing more. Sure, sometimes the reputation is true, sometimes, it’s hogwash…

I’ve worked for a Dutch company for 3 years, and been countless times to NL. The things people usually point out are more effects/consequences rather than a characterization of the Dutch. People don’t go to bruine kroegen because it’s what the Dutch do; rather people *can* go to these ‘brown bars’ because NL is what it is. Quite a difference.

As a Frenchman, I could confirm the “reputation” that our two countries have: it’s very hard for Dutch and French people to work together. I don’t think it means one or the other – or both – country is bad or whatever, it’s just that the mentalities are so different that working together on a daily basis is a chore.

I spoke with a lot of my non-Dutch colleagues about what felt “wrong” or odd when visiting NL, and we mostly agreed on an apparent lack of basic social skills. While being a very politically-correct bunch, the things you’ll hear sometimes is enough to make you reach for your gun. And what’s up with leaving for the day without even saying goodbye to the people around you? When we had visitors from Holland, we made sure they were taken care of and never left alone unless they asked. Never once was this basic curtesy returned when we visited HQ, which, incidentally, was located in the middle of nowhere. No transportation back to our hotels, nobody offered to give us a ride [and asking directly for one often felt like farting loud], no proposal to get a drink [and let’s not get into the topic of money…].

Yeah, I think the words that would come to mind would be cold, [seemingly] unfriendly/unpolite, and loneliness. I am not saying that French are any better, it’s just that this is what really felt different in Holland…

With all the people asking me where I’ve been, and a recent birthday bringing me so close to 40, it made me ask myself the same question, with various time milestones.

Where were you 20 years ago?
 Hmmm, I got my Baccalauréat in June 1985, and went to teach programming in a lake resort nearby Paris. Didn’t do much teaching [the kids were real dumb], and didn’t fancy wind-surfing. Then I went to a youth camp [again as a lecturer] in the Savoie mountains, learned rudiments of archery, and enjoyed it a bit more. I joined the University of Limoges in September that year.

Where were you 10 years ago?
 Easy: Korea. I was working as an independent translator and consultant. Learned to shoot pool from a Korean-Italian friend [right!]. I met the Oranckay that year in Prag.

Where were you 5 years ago?
 Easy: Korea. I had been managing the French Chamber of Commerce in Korea already for two years. Can’t say it was easy…

Where were you a year ago?
 Easy: Korea. I had been managing a Dutch company I shall not mention – grrr! – for three years. I left a few days later. Funny I am still in touch with many former managers – and even a few survivors, at least not the snakes… I have even been contacted by a former top manager on a new venture. Wish I had more attention span…
I met Da Marmot at my place for beer, food and banter. Think it was almost a year ago to a day. Oranckay of course was tagging along, as well as the aforementionned Korean-Italian, who was visiting Seoul, and couldn’t pass up the offer

Where were you six months ago?
 Bordeaux. Limoges. Seoul. Tokyo. Went on a biz trip. Went to see my mother before her surgery. The troubles started then…

Where were you in the last 30 days?
 Bordeaux. Limoges. Visited my mother. Had friends drop by.

What’s next?
 Bordeaux. Seoul. Maybe Tokyo, Saigon, Bangkok, Phuket. Hopefully some wine will be sold…