Category Archives: People

People

Giant Magnetoresistance

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The next time you listen to your iPod/MP3 player or use a memory stick to transfer files you should thank Albert Fert and Peter Grünberg who discovered Giant Magnetoresistance (or GMR) in the 1980’s.
Were it not for this, hard drives and memory sticks/cards could not be as small as they are today

Giant Magnetoresistance

Nearly 20 years later, they were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for independent discoveries leading to the same conclusion published in November 1988 and in March 1989 respectively.
It was a discovery ahead of it’s time which probably explains the time period between discovery and the prize being awarded.

Fundamental to the phenomenon is RKKY (Ruderman-Kittel-Kasuya-Yosida) interaction

RKKY Formula
H represents the Hamiltonian, Rij is the distance between the nuclei i and j, Iij is the nuclear spin of atom i, Δkmkm is a term that represents the strength of the hyperfine

It’s all rather nasty quantum mechanics – but in fact this interaction discovered in the 1950’s predicted what was to become GMR

27th June 2007

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27th June 2007 is going to be heralding an end to an era in the UK…
An era that began in July 1994 when Tony Blair became the leader of the Labour party which then lead to him becoming the Prime Minister of the UK in the 1997 General election
Anthony Charles Lynton Blair
I was too young to vote in those days (I was a mere 16 years old), but the result was very surprising. 12 years of Conservative party rule had come to an end. “Blairism” had begun… the theme tune Things Can Only Get Better by D:Ream was being played everywhere, and was genuinely being believed.
And I think things did indeed get better in Blair’s first term. There was a good balance of old Labour and New “Blairite” Labour.

Because they had won by such a large majority, it was inevitable that they would win the election 4 years later (in 2001), allowing blair to serve a 2nd term. This time I will always remember for the Stealth Taxes which Gordon Brown, the Chancellor used to make it seem like Labour weren’t increasing taxes, as they’d promises to do. The 2nd term was also dogged by the war in Iraq (2002), and after this there were fears that Labour would not win in 2005. They still had enough support, and with help from the Hutton Inquiry Labour was still in power after the 2005 election.

On 10th May 2007, Tony Blair announced that he would be standing down on 27th June as Party Leader, and election of a new leader began. Gordon Brown won without any competition within days as nobody else in the party could drum up enough support to mount a leadership campaign.

Why am I blogging about this you may ask?
Well… I’ll tell you one thing, that’s not what I’ll be looking forward to on 27th June. Released on that same day is the final part of the Die Hard series:

Live Free or Die Hard

Live Free or Die Hard

I hope Tony departs with a bang!

Cyclists jumping red lights and OSX junk accumulation

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The subject is about two entries really but I’m going to combine them into one blog post even though they’re not related apart from they were both thoughts/observations from the week.

I’ll start with Cyclists…
cyclist red light
I think it’s simply too dangerous to cycle in many parts of London, and being a Car driver I am largely going to have a streak against cyclists (apparently they are never wrong if you are in an accident with one). Having said that, I really think that they do bring some of it on themselves and shouldn’t carry the holier than thou attitude that many seem to.

I will never forget the morning where I was millimetres (it felt like that at the time and was probably a few metres) away from hitting a cyclist who jumped a red light. They were very fortunate that I was alert, that my brakes were in good working order and was therefore able to stop in time bearing in mind i was travelling at 25-30mph as I went through my green light. I will never forget the look on her face – there was no regret, apology or thank you. I was in complete shock. it was lucky I was only 10 minutes away from my workplace (though I was running late as usual) otherwise I would’ve had to stop in order to get my head straight.

Cyclists, along with Pedestrians, Motorists and Motorcyclists are subject in the UK to The Highway Code.

While Cyclists cannot be punished as easily as motorists can, dangerous or careless cycling is an offence that carries a fine of up to £2500. Note that cycling on the pavement is illegal and could be subject to a £500 fine. I have never heard of either of these being enforced.

I believe that cyclists jumping a red light should be fined and this should be enforced. It isn’t because police officers are usually based in cars or on the street and unable to catch them since they are more agile. Bikes don’t have number plates and there is no way to catch up with them once they’re out of site. So, how do you enforce this? Light-heartedly, I suggested that police officers should be sent out with lasso ropes to hook cyclists in from the street but this is clearly not practical. With a bit more thought, I came up with the idea that enforcing the highway code for cyclists could be handed over to traffic wardens on a commission basis.

Traffic wardens in the UK have become notorious for finding means of extracting more cash than ever from motorists in parking fines especially when they clamp them or tow them away. There are many private companies that are employed by UK councils to maximise the income often featuring a payment on commission system. Traffic wardens are generally hated by everyone in the country apart from their boss which would make them perfect for enforcing the law. So much so that some wardens in Scotland are equipped with spit testing kits so they can hunt down those that spit on them. If anyone can make cyclists think twice about jumping a red light, traffic wardens are the ones for the job. They are inventive and are used to having abuse thrown at them. They use bikes, mopeds, buses and cars to patrol their areas, and like nothing more than extracting money out of the public. They will spot whether you have parked 2mm into a no parking area or whether you’re 20 seconds late returning to your parking meter.

Rant over, I know there are plenty of perfectly safe cyclists out there, but the number you see who don’t wear helmets or have no lights at night – I always say to them under my breath that you’re not going to live long if you continue like that. For sure we don’t want to discourage cyclists, but if you are going to cycle on the road you need to obey the laws of the road. Otherwise you deserve everything you get if you get hit by a car.

Next, OS X…
I was doing a bit of a cleanup at the weekend when I noticed one of the partitions on one of my drives was nearly full
So I fired up one of my fave apps WhatSize 10 to find out what was taking up the most space these days and I was slightly alarmed about how much junk was in my startup volume:
• 787mb of Printer Drivers (most of which I don’t have)
• 385mb of saved install packages
• A 173mb Console Log
• 1.56Gb of iPod Photo Cache – bear in mind that the actual photos only take up 379mb – what’s going on here!

What on earth is going on? I’ve spent two weekends cleaning stuff up in various folders because I need the space for my iTunes library. Have managed to get my main drive up to 16Gb available now after finding two tv series’ in my movies folder and a site rip of some site which came to 3.4Gb. I’ve backed all this up to DVD. Still have the mammoth task of sorting my “to sort” folder and not sure what to do with the iPod Photo Cache, but it’s looking better!

The Youth of the Nation

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The modern day youth has gained a reputation of being a menace
youth crime
Growing up in an age of mobile phones, mp3 players, broadband Internet, Internet banking, and DVDs, & information is at your fingertips.
But with this has come the youth that hangs around outside shops with a group of mates at the weekend stereotypically wearing a hoodie and drinking cheap white lightning

The UK government tried to tackle the most problematic youths by introducing ASBOs (Anti Social Behaviour Orders) in the 1998 Crime and Disorder Act and has updated this several times since then.
ASBOs don’t necessarily just apply to youths, but largely they have been the ones issued with them. Have they worked? Depends on your point of view. The cynics say they haven’t because those issued with them tend to turn it on it’s head and brag to their mates and the ASBO gains a badge of honour status. And then there are those who have found that ASBO’s have sorted a local problem and are therefore huge fans. It’s hard to guage.

That aside, there have been several other schemes to stop youths loitering and causing trouble such as the sound that only young people can hear that is designed to repel troublemakers. It’s supposed to work on the principle that as we get older we lose the ability to hear higher sound frequencies, and this noise is too high a frequency for adults to hear. You can download the sound and see if you can hear it it’s supposed to sound like a mosquito. According to the report it was a large success at the Wyvern Theatre in Swindon.

The theory has again been turned on it’s head with The ringtone that those over 25 can’t hear. My hearing is fairly shoddy anyway because I had surgery on both my ears aged 3 and 10-15 years of loud rock music have taken their toll. I couldn’t hear the mosquito one, but could faintly hear the ringtone – to me it sounds a bit like one of those hearing tests I did when I was at school. See how good your ears are with the mp3 link on the page. Notice that they’ve conveniently missed out the 25-30 age range on the chart though, so they could get a convenient straight line descent with age!

While I was in Boston in September, I was watching a bit of CNN, and they reiterated the story of how the UK has more CCTV cameras than anywhere in the world and supplemented it with a story from Middlesborough. They’ve started a scheme where the camera operators can Speak to the people who they are watching. I don’t know about you, but to me it’s a bit much, and further evidence of the Nanny State that we are increasingly living in. Things like banning Fast Food adverts between children’s programmes don’t do much to change my view on this.

But enough of my side-track, onto the next one which I heard about last week.
New lights make faces and acne shine pink – couldn’t find a bbc story on this so you’ll have to have the trashy tabloid the daily mail as the source!
They did a test of it on radio the other day and they suggested it didn’t work particularly well, but we’ll have to wait and see the results

And of course, a rant about youths wouldn’t be complete without a story about teenage drinking on the rise and the obligatory Child aged nine admitted to hospital unconscious from alcohol. I made a note of this yesterday because it’s going to be shown on tv tomorrow and they’re claiming the figures came from the NHS (so i’m interested in where it came from):

Panorama’s Booze: What Teenagers Need to Know will be broadcast on BBC One on Sunday 19 November at 2215 GMT.

So, we’re using technology to tackle the problem, giving special powers to give out ASBOs, and drinking in teenagers is on the rise.
I was no model youth, and was underage drinking when I was a teenager. But I wasn’t being told I was acting antisocially, wasn’t drinking until I was hauled into an ambulance (though I came pretty close while I was at subway city at university). Is it all the teenager’s fault, or should the ASBO go to the parents to sort their child out? I dunno, but it always strikes me that those who get into this sort of mess are given an unfair start which they never make up for. Just my 2¢ worth plus a lot of links to keep you busy

Parkour

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I’ve become aware of this “sport” or as it is probably more correctly described, discipline and find it quite fascinating the way people are able to do this, but didn’t know what it was or was called. Well I now know a little bit about Parkour, so here we go!
parkour
Sometimes referred to as free running, though technically it is more than that, and free running is actually a related art more concerned with aesthetics. A Parkour participant, called a traceur, will generally be found in an urban area manoeuvring around the town or city using skills such as jumping, vaulting and climbing, or some of the more specific moves of the discipline.

It has it’s origins in france, and a traceur tends to describe the practice as a means for interacting with their environment. They will leap from roof to roof, and jump from them, often with a roll to flourish on the hard concrete/paved floor.

Parkour’s main aims are about evasion and reaching places that would be otherwise inaccessible, often for the purpose of evading a pursuer.

The name more than likely comes from the french Parcours meaning a journey or route (someone correct me if I’m wrong – my french is a little rusty)
The most well known traceurs are probably Sébastien Foucan, David Belle (both sites require flash and David Belle’s site is in French) and Stephane Vigroux, and subsequently following videos by the founder 3 traceurs has become popular in adverts, music videos and action films most notably in Luc Besson written Banlieue 13 in 2004, and Yamakasi – Les samouraïs des temps modernes in 2001

Sébastien has been in Madonna’s Hung up music video and this video shows some of the rehearsals – see the full video here – complete with sample from ABBA’s Gimme Gimme Gimme (I have such a gripe about this sort of sampling but I’ll leave that for another post)

Belle has been practising Parkour for 18 years since he was only 15 and is the founder of the Parkour Worldwide Association (PAWA) having conceived the idea as part of his youth. He would:

imagine scenarios where he had to use his physical abilities to escape difficult situations; scenarios where he would have to show strength and courage. How to get to a given place in order to carry out a rescue there? How to move so as not to be trapped? By acting out such scenarios, the agility of this intrepid youngster began to come into effect. Running, jumping, vaulting, climbing, hanging from things, keeping his balance, surpassing himself, developing his self-confidence, being able to overcome obstacles so he could contiinue to advance

Read more in this biography at parkour.net

I couldn’t find as much on Stephane Vigroux, and he doesn’t seem to have a web page, though I found an artcle on urbanfreeflow about the 3rd parkour founder

Sébastien split from the other two founders following a dispute over the depiction of free running in the filming of Yamakasi. He went on to film Jump London for UK television’s Channel 4 where he demonstrated free running/parkour in central london’s famous landmarks alond with Stephane’s brother Johann and Jerome Ben Aoues.

What you need now is some examples. Well, you can’t go too far wrong with the Wikipedia, Google Videos and YouTube combination, so here goes:
Nike Angry Chicken Advert – in french but dubbed into english
Toyota Scion advert Рwith S̩bastien Foucan and Jerome Ben Aoues
UK TV’s top gear: Peugot vs Parkour – What’s quicker at getting across Liverpool? A Peugot or the Parkour masters
David Belle for the BBC – Rush Hour – there’s loads more links on youtube if you like those

Bruno Bozzetto

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I came across the work of Bruno Bozzetto about 5 years ago knowing nothing about him but found his flash animations very funny.
I stumbled on his website bozzetto.com and have seen all his flash cartoons but had just assumed that he was an internet cartoonist for such work as Olympics and my favourite Europe Italy

In fact, as I found out today, he is a 70 year old man who has been an animator for many years with an entry on imdb showing his work to date since 1968. Apparently his film Allegro non troppo is his most well known but is difficult to find
bruno bozzetto

The character that he has become associated with is Signor Rossi:
signor rossi

Thoughts for the day

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As some of you may know i’ve had a few days vacation, and naturally while i’m away i tend to slow down, and during that time i often start thinking more
The last real break i had last christmas i had so many thoughts flooding through my mind i couldnt sleep, and that was a concept for a future web page i came up with. But as with all my web page concepts they are both a full time job and require me to learn programming that i dont know enough about.

But anyways, this holiday i was plagued by a concept that i’m sure i’ve heard asked before, and that i think about more while i’m at our holiday destination on the Venetian Lido suburb of Malamocco. And it was:

The water levels are rising as a consequence of global, and physics tells us that as we put objects in water the water is displaced in the ratio of mass/density. So, what would happen if we removed all the boats currently in the oceans and seas? Would the water level drop and by how much?

I wouldnt know where to begin to answer this question, nor whether anyone has attempted it

The second thought i started pondering me was on my way back from the airport yesterday when i got back to the UK. On the train i saw the many roofs that there are. It got me thinking, how many roofs worth of solar panels, combined with other environmentally friendly power such as tidal, wind and HEP would it take to meet the energy requirements of the UK? Are there enough roofs? If not what would be the shortfall? How much would it cost? Could money be saved in the longrun with all the complex taxing for governments who’s countries emit too much CO2?

But there you go, that’s what’s on my mind