February, 23, 2005 archives

URI::Fetch is a new perl module from ben trott (of movable type renown) that does compression, ETag, and last-modified handling when retrieving web resources. the lazyweb delivers again.

speaking of that, i found i had to do one additional thing to my php code that fetches pages because of a non-existent workaround for server bugs in the version of curl i’m using. so when blo.gs fetches a page to verify a ping and gets a particular compression-related error, it goes back out and requests the page again without compression.

elf is a neat little service that consolidates library accounts, with a unified calendar of when your books are due, and email reminders.

it helped remind me to renew some of the books i have out that were due just the other day, although it didn’t do anything to help me with the books i have out that are already overdue and can’t be renewed. when i went to see the talk by michael shermer, publisher of skeptic magazine, i took the copy of on intelligence by jeff hawkins and sandra blakeslee that i was nearly finished with, but turned it in while i was leaving. i was very close to done, but i decided to turn it in rather than rack up more fines.

speaking of fines, i just now noticed that the fines and fees will be increased on march 14, 2005. the basic adult book late fee is going from 20¢ a day to 25¢.

when i checked in for the talk this evening, the person doing the check-in recognized my name from the batch of reservations i made for other upcoming talks. i signed up for about a half-dozen of the march/april alôud talks.