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I know these pages have been quiet lately but a man’s got stuff to think about…like passing the last exam (ODE: remember?)

I received the best mail a student can get from a professor. The subject line was “Champagne“. Can you believe it?

It basically said that I’m graduating in a few weeks.

If you’re in Milan and got time to kill on July the 23rd, feel free to take a plunge in the super hot Politecnico classrooms where I’ll be discussing my thesis and become an Engineer!

Stay tuned, more to come!

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Well today is RSS awareness day, and RSS advocates should promote and raise the global awareness of RSS as a tool.

Not this time. Remember ODE? Well, it’s time to try again and this what is going to occupy my labour day afternoon.

Instead, I’m gonna link you to a very informative post on “Avventure Planetarie”, hoping Paolo will forgive me for the recent content piggybacking (Voyager, now RSS…)

It’s in Italian, (and I know a few readers will be pleased), but for you non-italian speakers, check out RSSday, the website promoting the event presenting RSS using a nice video. (with an awful audio, though)

Oh, and I expect to see a definite increase in RSS subscriptions in tomorrow stats,  mmkay? :-)

Stay tuned, more to come.

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Yuppie Flu are an Italian band that plays lo-fi pop arranged with analog electronic keyboards [from Last.FM, I suck at recognizing genres]. Their songs are in English, so go ahead and look for them, it’s really worth it.

The new album came out today, with the cool formula that Radiohead pioneered last year: pay-as-much-as-you-want. Yes, even nothing, for a 160 kbit/s, MP3, DRM Free version of the album.

I bought it and I’m not telling you how much I paid. It’s not zero and it’s not 1 euro. But it’s not the 15€ they offer for the physical CD version, nor the 25€ CD + T-shirt version. I strongly encourage you to try the album, and pay, even a symbolical sum, for it. This is how music distribution should work.

Get it here. It’s the homepage, but the links to buy with paypal (not incredibly usable, to be honest, but maybe it’s monday’s Human Computer Interaction test speaking for me :-) )

Stay tuned, more to come.

-– EDIT:

I posted before learning of this kind of contest they have. Apparently, by posting on my blog about the new album, I might win a ticket for one of their concerts, and give away one to one of my readers.

But I have to set up a contest as well! So…the reader that will post the best comment (i.e. the most convincing one: BE ORIGINAL) is going to come to the concert with me, should I get the tickets. Start fighting, multiple entries allowed :)

…come on guys, not so fast…

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I created another script like Writing Room for Google Docs (<brag>featured script on LifeHacker!! </brag>).

This time is for iGoogle. Allows to get rid of the annoying (but pretty, with the right theme) header bar and the totally useless footer bar.

Should you need the header bar (e.g. for undo-ing a gadget removal), theres a convenient link on top, Writing Room style.

The default is NOT showing the headerbar, since I use iGoogle as a at-a-glance kickstart in the morning. (todo, agenda, mail….the usual)

Example? Sure, there you are.

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Once again, I borrow the words of my friend and science communicator Paolo Amoroso, on his blog.

“RAI neglects science for the sake of audience”

[…]

“A waste of public money for shows that deny the genuinity of the Apollo lunar landings”

[…]

“In the march 3rd episode of the show ‘Voyager’ RAI gives free speech to the conspiracy theory ramblings”

[…]

“Roberto Giacobbo (hosts) Voyager, a TV show for everything misterious….for a 8 years old child!”

But there’s more. A friend and fellow partecipant in the italian Forum “Forumastronautico” noted and commented on every error and misconception presented in the shameful show, an impressive display of ignorance (or, more likely, lucid exploitation of the public ignorance)  that totals an astounding rate of one error every 36 seconds of show. Enjoy (in Italian, sorry)

Makes me even happier for not owning a TV .

Stay tuned, more to come.

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Check it out! 

Stay tuned, more to come.

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This post is made in order to avoid telling the same thing to 1000 people asking me “how’s it going? Are you graduating next month?” .  I wrote it quickly. It doesn’t have a structure. It’s a stream of thoughts with little or no filter. My English probably sucks more than the average. Be warned.

Today I flunked ODE (Ordinary Differential Equations). My last exam before graduation. I’ve got nothing to complain about, the grade is totally fair. It’s my fault.

I had 3 tests on this session, 20 credits. 2 down (15 creds), one standing. This semester was supposed to be my “cushion” semester. Kind of an extra time to “heal” the “wounds” I got on the road from first year to now.  Three, tough, exams, and plenty of time.  I failed to manage time. I procrastinated. Then I rushed. And then here I am.

Yesterday I felt like a runner on km 41. One, last kilometer to go. The asphalt became glue. Muscles not responding. Tunnel vision. Panic.

I realized I wasn’t going to make it, but I kept walking, not running. I got overtook by my “wingman”. Good for him.

It’s funny that I passed every single exam regarding Computer Science and I’m being held back by a PURE MATH exam, about stuff with little or no real use in my career.

Now what? Now what? My plans go as far as tomorrow night. I can’t even think straight right now. A couple of consequences come to mind: the Chicago Project is officially canceled. Well, it was ambitious, wasn’t it? Maybe it’s better off this way, maybe it’ll turn in something else. Who knows.

My plans for the master degree in Milano change too. And, right now, I do not have the energy to think about it. Any conclusion is biased by a mix of disappointment, anger. I’m exhausted. I need to rest.

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I haven’t been talking about my project because I’m quite busy with exams and graduat…er…nothing. Don’t want to jinx it, the situation is desperate enough without me talking about it.

Just a quick catch up:

• I paid the $60 application fee for international students. I ended up paying the bank 61,17 € (EURO!) for the process. A fracking robbery.

• I queued in my university offices for an official marks sheet, translated in english, with grades average. Since I’m not graduated yet, it was short of 3 exams, with an average lower than the requirements (req: 24/30. My avg: 23.82, now lowered by a stupid mark I got last week). Meeting the requirements is getting harder and harder.

• I sent a copy of my TOEFL score. (109/120. Come on. Dear UIC, unlike many other people applying, I might not have the average, but I do speak your language! Does that count?). For the records, the required score is 80.

• I started to think about money and, frankly, I got quite scared. Two semesters, 2 to 4 flights, an apartment, living expenses. As soon as I get my mind clear on this, I’ll post some numbers.

Things don’t look very good, to say the truth. The first derivative of my motivation is approaching -∞. Can’t really tell if an inflexion point is about to come. I can’t really compute the second derivative. (I haven’t been making this kind of low-tech calculus humor since high school).

Nevertheless, today I woke up early, packed up my documentation in a neat DHL envelope, and sent the stuff over to the windy city. (36 Freaking Euro, 2 days delivery)

Let’s keep the ball rolling and see what happens, I’m not giving up without a fight. A small fight.

Stay tuned, more to come.

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Heh. When procrastination brings productivity. I was working in Google Documents on my thesis, and felt that something wasn’t quite right. The header was taking too much space and on my 13.3” widescreen every vertical pixel is precious.

So I came up with this tiny Greasemonkey script that allows to toggle the header bar in Google documents, providing more room for working. Plus I wasn’t really feeling like working on the thesis ;-)
Example after the jump

…from this…

…to this…

You can find the script here.

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