Disney Imagineering and Geoffrey Fox

Midnight Message time. I wonder what people who find my blog via search engines think of these. One thing that really amazes me is that a post I wrote about 2 weeks ago, Chuck Norris Jokes, now ranks #4 in Google for the search “Chuck Norris Jokes”, and people are leaving comments with more jokes. It’s hilarious. I love Google. I wonder if those people look further into my blog. If they do, I hope they bookmark it or add it to their RSS reader. But I must admit that unless they actually like the stuff I write, my blog isn’t very welcoming. I should add a “Welcome!” note to the front page. Maybe that would make people feel more or less at home.

Speaking of more or less, I went to a lecutre by Geoffrey Fox today. He called it “e-moreorlessanything”, referring to a whole new breed of Internet web sites powered by web services. He defines web services very broadly, meaning basically anything on the Internet and the way it’s all wrapped up with XML and is separated into modules. It was an interesting talk.

Earlier in the evening, I went to a lecture given by someone from Walt Disney Imagineering. He does construction management or something like that, and showed us how they use 4D software to create the models and time schedules for rides, such as Project Everest in Florida, Soarin’ (over California), and Space Mountain (the new version). It was very interesting and defintiely eye-opening. I never realized that Turtle Talk with Crush is powered by puppeteers and are basically virtual puppets. Also, the haunted house uses a projector mounted below your seat which is then reflected off a mirror to produce the holographic-seeming imagery. Imagineering would be a cool job. It looks like Disney is just getting their Intern stuff off the ground. Not sure if I’ll try submitting a resume or not.

This morning I had my 8 AM Physics lab. It went well. I mixed up the video stuff because I didn’t start recording at the beginning of the tape, and the camera didn’t show timestamps for any of the footage, so it was basically impossible to find what I had filmed. I’m impressed with their video capture quality though, considering that it’s analog. Still, digital is worlds better. Technology continues to amaze even me.

After that, I had Tennis. It’s going as usual. It’s good just to get out and spend an hour rallying. I’m not sure if I’m improving, but at least I know I have my grip right. My thumb is supposed to go between my middle and index fingers, not above them or on top of them. I still need to do the tennis match reports. I’m only taking the 1-unit course pass/fail, however, so there’s no pressure…

I pretty much skipped lunch. My meal schedule was all mixed up today. I didn’t even go to EVK or Parkside at all. I had some sushi around lunch time (but late) and a B Berrier Odwalla drink just now. I also had a sweet potato snack right before CS 102. Professor Crowley is awesome. He’s not the most knowledgeable or skiled guy, nor the best teacher (I fall asleep often, I admit — and he doesn’t seem to take offense), but he is incredibly nice and goes out of his way to be helpful. That is really awesome, and puts him on the recommended list in my book. I followed him to CS 105, a class in which they cover HTML/CSS — mainly user interface design. It was originally about object-oriented programming as well, but now most students take CS 102 before 105 (rather than the other way around which used to sometimes be the case), so he can get the object-oriented teaching out of the way quickly and move into the more interesting stuff.

CS 201 apparently has server-side scripting technologies. That’s what I really want to do. PHP/MySQL I’ve done, but there’s so much more. I’m good at it, but I’m by no means an expert. Plus, I’ve never ever taken a formal class in any of this stuff. It’s fascinating to see other students learning this and to hear it in a formal teaching environment. It’s even strange sometimes. I’ve read so many opinions and options about these technologies and languages on the Internet that I feel like a super-well-informed listener, critiquing the lecturer’s research, sometimes thinking “oh, he must have read that at such-and-such website…”