Category Archives: Cyberspace & Technology

The Weekend

The signing was uneventful; not bad but not really classifiable as good, either. There was going to be mead served by the store to celebrate, which was a lovely idea, but when the bottles were opened the contents unfortunately proved to be undrinkable. I appreciated the thought, though.

There were about a dozen people who stopped by so that I could finally sign their books, and/or to congratulate me. I’m told the books sold lots during the day, but by the time of the signing the crowds had vanished, leaving the store remarkably empty. Thanks go out to Sandman7 and Talyesin, who were waiting for me when I got there and whose moral support was invaluable, otherwise I probably just would have turned around and gone home. Which would have been a pity, really, because Jteethy and Pasley and t! and Jan and Mousme all showed up later too, and of course HRH and Liam made an appearance. As the only one I was expecting was HRH, the presence of friends made me feel nice and warm inside. The staff were wonderful and supportive, too.

There’s something about the month of September that I simply love. Maybe it’s that particular quality of golden light. Maybe it’s the crisper evenings, or the need for a light cardigan during the day. Whatever it is, I feel more relaxed and happy throughout this month than during any other month. We took the light coverlet off the bed yesterday and put on the fluffy, snuggly eiderdown quilt, buttoned into the denim duvet. And we did it just in time, too, because the temperature went down to a brisk eight degrees last night. We also took the air conditioner out of the kitchen window, so the kitchen has full light again, which really makes a difference in the morning.

Friday night Blade came downstairs, and spent more time unscrewing the dozen finicky little screws holding the two halves of the router together than unplugging the fan. We were so tired that the actual microsecond of unplugging it was remarkably funny in contrast to the lengthy lead-up, leading HRH to peek into the office because we were laughing so hard. It was a very small fan to be producing the huge threatening rattle that it had been. Now my router is silent and stealthy, because it has no moving parts. While Blade worked on that, I opened up the tower casing and turned it so I could see the motherboard. “See that?” said Blade, pointing to the RAM with the screwdriver. “Take it out.” I did. “Now plug the new one in.” I did. It was being a bit stubborn about snapping in, so Blade gave it a extra push, and there it was, installed. I closed up the case and started the computer, and I had a functional system that didn’t get nervous when I opened more than two programs simultaneously. I know more about the innards of computers than I give myself credit for knowing. “Next time you want a new computer,” said Blade, “I’m just going to throw a bunch of computer components and a screwdriver into a room with you, and close the door. When you come out with the computer, you’ll get a prize.” I just like having Blade around so that if I try to do the wrong thing, he’ll stop me.

Right. To work.

Warning: Incipient Hardware Violence

Goodbye, Internet; I am about to stab my very noisy whiny router with something blunt but dense in order to cause as much damage as possible. Or possibly just turn it off.

When I need to take another break, I will turn it on again in order to do research on a replacement router, because I can’t take this thing much longer. It sounds like I’m working next to a vacuum cleaner. It somehow was left on for four days straight while we were gone (although I could have sworn I turned it off like I do every night, being obsessive about things like that, particularly before a long weekend away) and we came home to the thing sounding like it was revving up to take off from Cape Canaveral, complete with threatening an explosion midair. It’s worse than it’s ever been, and I want to kill it dead dead dead because it’s getting into my brain and I can’t make it stop. Not even playing Zombie Chickens at top volume masks it.

So joy: a new router gets added to my list of things I need to buy for the computer when my cheque comes in, right below that new stick of RAM.

Grr

I just spent an hour running around not getting the two things I needed to get. No 16-gauge copper wire with which to bribe tonight’s babysitter. Worst of all, no new CD player for the car. Because, you know, a hundred dollars of hidden costs (above and beyond the extra fifty I’d already budgeted to cover such costs, which makes for one hunded fifty over the actual price of the unit) makes for a very cranky me and a very firm “Forget it” to the salesguy. The extra costs — equipment adaptors, installation, blah blah blah — totalled more than the unit itself, by a couple of dollars.

Cranky. Although the salesguy was kind enough to show me an alternate unit that was fifty dollars less, with all the same features and a longer base warranty, made by an equally reliable company. I didn’t ask for a quote on the extra equipment needed to adapt it to our car, which was dumb, but I was too annoyed to hang around, and certainly too cranky to make a split-second decision. I’ll send HRH in at some point instead and he can ask.

Grr.

Now I go to do a final read and polish on my submissions for the local Neopagan journal. I’m hoping I like them enough to avoid serious rewrites.

Life Is Determined To Unhinge Me

Yes, because an unstable hard drive threatening failure is precisely what I need right now.

Blade, if you could stop by tonight, I’d really appreciate it. I’ve done all I can without your expertise. (I’m probably blowing my chances of a third-degree Geek Cord by calling in a friend, but a hard drive is a hard drive, not a card or a peripheral.)

I’m going to go back up while I can. Then I think I’ll go cry, then beat something up.

ETA: Hang on — it’s my back-up drive that’s had the biscuit. It’s not even registering as being on the computer. Still not good, of course, but at least it’s not the end of the world, either. I’m going to back up to CDs, because I don’t trust anything today. Blade, it still wouldn’t hurt for you to come scowl at it.

Just What Does Amazon Sales Ranking Mean Anyway?

Brent Sampson has figured it out, and it’s remarkably unlike how one expects it to be calculated. Which in turn means that what it means is different than what one would suppose it to mean.

In actuality, the process is somewhat more convoluted than they let on. Only the top 10,000 books are updated every hour and the ranking does not depend upon the actual number of books sold, but rather, on a comparison against the sales figures of the other 9,999 books within that same hour. Simultaneously, a trending calculation is applied to arrive at a computerized sales trajectory. So, hypothetically, a book that held a ranking of 2,000 at 2pm and 3,000 at 3pm, might hold a 4,000 ranking at 4pm, even if it actually sold MORE books between 3-4 than it did between 2-3.

Books with rankings between 10,000 and 100,000 are recalculated once a day, rather than once an hour. Current projections, as well as historic sales information play a key role in these calculations. In fact, the predictive nature of the Amazon ranking system is what makes it possible for a newly-released book to outrank an older established title, even though the actual sales figures for the latter far exceed the former.

(Via Bookninja.)