Here’s a bit of free advice to laptop makers … putting the headphone jack on the right side of the laptop is dumb. That’s where just about everybody has their mouse, and driving your mouse over the headphone wire every 5 minutes or so is annoying. I’m really surprised when computer makers don’t think about this stuff.

So I’m working on a Web service for a client. I have a suite of unit tests that work properly, but when the client tries to access the Web service, the request fails. Before I made some changes to the service (including upgrading some libraries that shouldn’t matter), both my tests and the customer’s client worked as expected. So I’m left with the problem of figuring out how my tests differ in their operation from the customer’s client application. The best way I know of to figure this out is to log the full incoming requests and see how they differ, but I don’t know how to do that. Do you have any ideas? (The web service runs on Tomcat 5 and Apache 2.)

So I wanted to create a QuickTopic today, but I couldn’t remember my password. So I told the site to send me my password. It didn’t. Anyone else had this problem?

Update: QuickTopic will send you your password … eventually. I’m probably going to get about 13 copies of it when it’s all said and done.

Looks like I was right about customers taking care of the Sinclair problem. They’re now saying they were never going to run that anti-Kerry documentary in the first place.

Update: Apparently they’re going to run a documentary ostensibly about campaign-related documentaries that’s just going to provide a forum for anti-Kerry Vietnam vets to slam John Kerry. Keep the pressure on.

Adrian Holovaty has posted the transcript of an email interview he did with a Business Week reporter on the effect of BugMeNot on newspaper web sites. His response to her questions about how to deal with BugMeNot was to suggest simply not requiring users to register before viewing content. Novel idea.

Update: Here’s the article.

So I just noticed that now that I’ve installed Google Desktop on my computer, when I use Google to search the Web, results of the search on my local computer are noted at the top of the search results as well. That is seriously cool, and it doesn’t seem to slow down the search at all.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a late adopter when it comes to hardware. I finally set up a wireless network a couple of weeks ago, and today I hooked my Tivo into the network. Now it’s finally time to start playing with the Home Media features of the Tivo. I’m sure online scheduling will come in handy one of these days.

President Bush has issued a “no draft” pledge, but the signs are increasingly obvious that the Army (and Marines) are stretched beyond thin. I read today that the Army is shipping the unit that serves as opposing forces in military exercises to fight in Iraq. There’s no doubt that they’ll do an excellent job, but it says something about the general lack of resources in the Army that they’d ship this unit to Iraq. People worry about President Bush invading another country if he’s reelected, but it looks more and more every day like the military just won’t be prepared to engage in such an activity anytime soon. It’s going to take some time to reconstitute itself after Iraq is pacified or abandoned.

Matthew Yglesias has a post referring to the Putinization of America. It sounds hyperbolic, but is it?

You know, I don’t think the FCC or any government agency should do anything about Sinclair Broadcasting forcing the stations it owns to show an hour of anti-Kerry propaganda before the election. And I don’t think that this episode illustrates the dangers of media consolidation. You can pick up any newspaper or watch any news show and see condemnation of Sinclair Broadcasting. Even the business pages are full of stories about how this is a horrible business decision, and about how Sinclair is putting politics ahead of its shareholders. There’s no doubt that Sinclair’s management is a bunch of sleazy hypocrites who care more about making sure their favored leader returns to office than about democracy, fairness, or good common sense. Indeed, everybody but the most ardent Bush supporters seem to acknowledge the basic unfairness and the creepiness of what Sinclair Broadcasting is doing. So at this point I don’t see what the problem is. The outrage is off the meter, and it seems apparent at this point that this decision is going to hurt Sinclair Broadcasting a lot more than it’s going to hurt John Kerry. It’ll probably hurt President Bush some as well, since it triggers the thought that if certain rich and powerful people are willing to do so much to get him elected, they must be getting something in return.