0ink! » Guaranteed to contain absolutely zero ink!

You might have noticed the site has been down the last couple of days. That’s because my host has just upgraded our server. The site would have been up sooner, but I did not realise there was a name change for the MySQL server as well. Well, after a minor re-configuration, 0ink is back!

Note: There still is a problem with mod_rewrite, so parts of this site is inaccessible at the moment. Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

Update: All has been fixed! Thanks to the team from Bur.st Networking!

Researchers have developed smart glasses that can auto-focus on the subject of interest.

The first commercially available glasses will be reading glasses that can switch focus from reading to normal mode automatically. This can help reduce eye strain associated with using bifocals.

An infrared laser built into the bridge of the glasses will help determine accurately the distance to the subject. The liquid crystals in the lens will then adjust accordingly to put the subject into focus.

Essentially, the glasses work on the same principles as an auto-focusing camera. Due to the miniaturisation of components, it is now possible to wear technology such as this on your face.

A company called PixelOptics, based in Virginia, US, plans to sell glasses containing dynamic lenses commercially within two years. “The prototype is pretty bulky, but when these hit the streets they’ll be virtually indistinguishable from other, very stylish glasses,” says Ronald Blum, CEO of PixelOptics.

Awe…I quite like the look of the prototype.

How long before we can get glasses equipped with night vision, telescopic ability and can take happy-snaps?

This post is a little deeper than usual, with a bit of a sci-fi twist to it. That’s because the topic sounds like something that came out of a sci-fi novel, or an episode of Star Trek.

So, what could be so out of this world?

Judging by the post title you would probably guess it has to do with some form of travel. And you would be right. To elaborate, it has to do with space travel.

When we think about space travel, we think about rockets and maybe, if we are a little more adventurous, ion drives.

If you have ever seen an episode of Star Trek, you would notice that the Starship Enterprise is no ordinary rocket propelled starship. It is powered by a warpdrive. When the Enterprise initiates “warp”, it stretches and then does a vanishing act…into where?

The place it goes to is basically another dimension. This other dimension has many names: warpspace, slipspace or hyperspace, to name a few*.

Due to the different laws that govern physics in hyperspace, the Enterprise is able to travel faster than the speed of light.

So what? Star Trek is just TV show. Faster-than-light (FTL) travel only exists in science-fiction. And even if it were scientifically possible, the technology to achieve it wouldn’t be possible until maybe the year 2266.

Well, it seems the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics doesn’t think it’s that far-fetched an idea.

Every year they award prizes for the best papers presented at their annual conference. Last year the winner for nuclear and future flight category went to a paper calling for experimental tests of a hyperdrive motor. A motor that would propel a craft through another dimension at enormous speeds.

The concept does rely some obscure theories by Burkhard Heim that have yet to be fully peer reviewed (due to his reclusiveness when he was still alive and the complexity of the theory itself). However, the AIAA and the US military do seem to take Heim theory seriously.

The AIAA is certainly not embarrassed. What’s more, the US military has begun to cast its eyes over the hyperdrive concept, and a space propulsion researcher at the US Department of Energy’s Sandia National Laboratories has said he would be interested in putting the idea to the test. And despite the bafflement of most physicists at the theory that supposedly underpins it, Pavlos Mikellides, an aerospace engineer at the Arizona State University in Tempe who reviewed the winning paper, stands by the committee’s choice. “Even though such features have been explored before, this particular approach is quite unique,” he says.

At the moment, the main reason for taking the proposal seriously must be Heim theory’s uncannily successful prediction of particle masses. Maybe, just maybe, Heim theory really does have something to contribute to modern physics. “As far as I understand it, Heim theory is ingenious,” says Hans Theodor Auerbach, a theoretical physicist at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich who worked with Heim. “I think that physics will take this direction in the future.”

Maximum warp. Engage!

Article: Take a leap into hyperspace
Theory: Heim theory
Open Letter: Research Group Heim Theory
* Discworld inhabitants might be more familiar with L-space.

KIN 0.4.5 0.4.6 is out. The main reason for this release is to address a security issue whereby notes were accessible by different users who did not create the note. Now, notes are accessible only to the author of the note.

Other changes include better version checking. Load times should be a bit faster now. There have also been some minor code tweaking and enhancements here and there.

Get the new version on the plugins page.

Update: Version 0.4.6 fixes some bugs that arose due to my haste in releasing the last version. Oops! my bad.

As I was thinking about this entry, I wasn’t sure what category it should fall under. It’s news, but is it humourous? I’ll let you judge.

Apparently, Miyoko Kawahara, a 59 year old woman in Japan has been sentenced to a year imprisonment as punishment for assault resulting in injury to her neighbour. The assault weapon used? Loud music!

“The act was tenacious and insidious, and caused great trouble to the neighbour”, presiding Judge Tetsuya Okuda said in handing down the ruling.

It was reported, that the neighbour suffered dizziness due to the loud music and needed one month of observation as a result.

In my opinion, she was lucky to only get a year; the prosecutors wanted three years for the crime.

As I am writing this however, another thought entered my mind - this case is remarkably similar to how U.S. forces have used heavy metal and Sesame Street(?!) music as an interrogation technique on enemy combatants in the Middle East.

Let’s hope they didn’t bring out Billy Rae Cyrus’ “Achy Breaky Heart”.

That’s definitely torture wherever you’re from!