Here’s an error message thrown by a NOAA application:

Error: Not Enough Data Available to be Displayed

There are less than 5 observations available for the selected parameter. Attempting to graph this data may give the impression that no data is available, so building of the graph was aborted.

I understand completely what the error message means, mostly because it sounds like the kind of error message that a programmer (like me) would write to describe what had happened. But it does strike me as rather user-hostile.

Courtesy of Microsoft’s new “Google Maps killer,” here’s a bird’s eye view of downtown Boston.

On the right is Government Center, running up the middle is the New England Holocaust Memorial and near the middle is The Yankee Publishing Building, at 33 Union Street, home to our advertising department colleagues at Yankee Publishing.

Just out of view at the top of the photo (you can scroll) is Faneuil Hall.

Doesn’t work in Safari, but works fine in Firefox on the Mac.

Ran into a PHP problem this morning, and [[Olle]] helped me find a workaround, so I thought I should publish here for the benefit of others.

If you are comparing two values in PHP — let’s say a password that a user has entered and a password that it stored in a database. In most cases you can compare them like this:

But — and here’s the problem — if the two values you are comparing both look to PHP like they are numbers, PHP will compare them as numbers even if they “look different.”

For example, if you are comparing 1234 with 001234, PHP will consider them to be “equal” if you compare them as above.

This is because PHP is “too smart for its own good” and “helpfully” converts all integer-like strings to integers for comparison purposes (as explained here: “If you compare two numerical strings, they are compared as integers”).

The simple solution:

By prepending a string (“s”) to each side of the comparison, PHP is prevented from helpfully converting the string to integers, and the two are thus deemed not equal as they should be.

Thanks for the help, Olle.

Tod Maffin, who almost singlehandedly broke the back of the CBC lockout with his seminal role in marshaling podcasting efforts from the line (yes, I’m exaggerating, but not completely), is covering the tech beat for this federal election in a new blog. Good stuff.

The December issue of YANKEE has a piece about Massachusetts singer-songwriter Lori McKenna. YANKEE is making a free MP3 of her song If You Ask available. It’s a worthwhile download.

I’m now convinced that there are episodes, perhaps induced by sunspots or other amorphous forces, that cause sudden surges in technology-related problems. In the past 48 hours we’ve been experiencing DNS problems, server problems, network problems, and AOL email problems. Everything appears unrelated to everything else. Technology, of course, is expected to break. Why does it have to happen all at once, though?

A few notes gathered in the field today:

• The café at the Friendly Pharmacy (down on Water St. on Charlottetown’s waterfront) is no more. Word from the pharmacist is that they needed the space for a new doctor’s office.
• Honest Tea is back at the University Ave. Shopper’s Drug Mart. At least for now. There’s no longer any trace of Bottle Green, which appeared to have replaced it.
• My dentist (the excellent Dr. Don Stewart at Cornwall Dental Clinic) gives out free Oral B “sensitive” toothbrushes. Presumably he gets these for free from Oral B in return for the exposure. Except that it seems as though you can’t actually buy the same toothbrush in stores. Weird.
• All of the Murphy’s Pharmacies appear to be tied together with a common inventory system (hence you’ll often be prompted “do you want me to check the other stores?” if a particular store is out of stock of something). Interestingly enough, when I requested a product that none of the stores carry regularly, the clerk at their West Royalty Pharmacy branch told me that they could order it in and it would be there tomorrow. This makes me think they’re tied into some giant drug warehouse that they can tap into at will.
• The Pharmasave at Ellis Bros. shopping centre that, as reported earlier, is moving to much bigger quarters next door, still hasn’t moved. Looks like construction is taking a little longer than expected.

We experienced a brief server outage here due to disk crash on our main DNS server. Things are back to normal now, but you may have had either difficulty getting here this morning or, if you arrived, have noticed weirdness in the sidebar.

The Chronicles of Narnia film opens later this week, and so we need to decide whether it’s a good idea to take 5-year-old [[Oliver]] or not. Here’s how the film was rated in various places:

• British Board of Film Classification — PG plus “Contains mild threat, battle and fantasy violence.”
• The Nova Scotia Alcohol & Gaming Authority’s Film Classification Division — PG
• Alberta Film Ratings - PG plus “May Frighten Young Children.”
• Australian Office of Film and Literature Classification — PG plus “Mild fantasy violence, Some scenes may upset young children.”
• British Columbia Film Classification Office — PG plus “frightening scenes violence.”
• Ontario Film Review Board — PG plus “frightening scenes; violence; not recommended for young children.”

So, the western world’s general consensus is “young kids will get scared.” Hmmmm.

Did you know that the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops has an Office for Film and Broadcasting that is, among other things, “…responsible for reviewing and rating theatrical motion pictures.” They have a page of current reviews that is updated weekly. Their reviews are surprisingly well-written and I suspect they would be quite useful if you were concerned that your movie choices mirrored your religious ones; they haven’t reviewed Narnia yet, but here’s their capsule review of Shop Girl as an example:

Shopgirl — Languidly paced story of lonely and lovelorn Saks salesclerk (an appealing Claire Danes) who, after a tentative fling with a nerdy, awkward font artist (Jason Schwartzman), meets a wealthy older man (Steve Martin) and commences a no-strings-attached affair that proves only fitfully satisfying for her. Director Anand Tucker’s adaptation of Martin’s novella — though striving for old-fashioned Hollywood gloss and a bittersweet tone about people’s search for connection — feels patently unreal, and the characters (although human in their imperfections) display less-than-commendable behavior, though the ending would seem to be morally sound. Smattering of crude language, brief profanity, partial and rear nudity, sexual situations and banter, a permissive view of premarital sex and condom use. L — limited adult audience, films whose problematic content many adults would find troubling.

Any review that begins “languidly paced” deserves some credit; their review of Syriana starts “Intermittently engaging but mostly confusing political thriller…” which earns them even more. The Catholic Church in Australia has a similar office.

If you’re looking for more “film reviews from a religious perspective,” check out Focus on the Family movie review site. Their reviews are somewhat more strident than the Catholic Bishops’ are, and they’re much less well-written. Here’s a snip from their Shop Girl review:

Shopgirl brings Steve Martin’s best-selling novella to life by painting a poignant, painful picture of the consequences of soulless sex. Even as Ray’s and Mirabelle’s bodies unite, we see that sex alone is not enough to sustain a relationship. The film shows that physical intimacy promises a depth of emotional connection that it can never deliver apart from a lasting, committed relationship.

If you want to jump right in to the hard-edged “this is truly evil” film reviews from the religious perspective, it seems like Dr. Ted Baehr’s reviews hit the mark. Described as “a ministry dedicated to redeeming the values of the mass media according to biblical principles, by influencing entertainment industry executives and helping families make wise media choices,” Baehr pulls few punches. While our Catholic friends think Syriana simply “mostly confusing,” Baehr rates it “Abhorrent” and says, in part:

Very strong humanist, socialist, politically correct worldview with very strong anti-capitalist and Anti-American content that demonizes big oil companies and the U.S. government for Middle East oil interests by painting them as materialistic fiends and heartless profiteers, as well as some very strong anti-biblical and anti-Jewish elements that depict Christian theology and Western philosophies as failing worldviews and empathize with Islamic terrorists.

Seems like this might be a case of “if Ted doesn’t like it, count me in” — I’m all for demonizing big oil and the U.S. government. His take on Narnia, which he calls “Absolutely Thrilling!” and rates “Wholesome,” begins:

Very strong Christian worldview with clear incarnational allusions to the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ as the only way to break the power of sin and defeat the powers of darkness, slightly mitigated by a strong empowering of human beings and a very slight failure to include the full sacramental references of the book and the Creator references to the Emperor-Beyond-the-Sea, as well as a couple of politically correct nods, including a statement dismissive of war, a nod to defining the contents of a healing potion given to Lucy, a modernist view of women in allowing Susan to fire a bow and arrow in war, and a slightly attenuated mention of the Creation, not the Creator, in the coronation of the four children (these discrepancies are all very minor, however, because they are presented in a context where the Christian perspective of the novel dominates); no foul language; action violence and scary creatures that may be too frightening for younger children, including bombing of London, battles with wolves, swordfights, ugly creatures, the witch stabs Aslan to kill him, and many battle scenes; no sex; minor upper male nudity; no alcohol; smoking a pipe; and, nothing else objectionable.

In case you’re keeping score, that’s one very long sentence. And perhaps that sentence is enough to keep me home watching Sesame Street with Oliver instead; scary scenes is one thing, but there’s no way I want him exposed to something as dangerous as a “modernist view of women” or “a statement dismissive of war” to say nothing of “a slightly attenuated mention of the Creation.”

Sigh.

Here’s a 5-year chart (courtesy of Yahoo!) showing the value of the Canadian dollar vs. the U.S. dollar:

I know next to nothing about the currency market, and even less about trend lines and predicting, but it seems pretty clear to me that, all other things being equal, we’re heading for equivalence sometime in 2007.

Here’s a federal issue that it’s hard to know how to get behind. Certainly governments have marketed the lower Canadian dollar in recent years to those in the U.S„ especially Hollywood and tourists, as a reason for doing business with us — “your dollar goes farther,” etc.

As this benefit quickly slides away — which, if I understand economics correctly, is a generally good thing, economy-wise, as it means that others think Good Things about Canada, and thus consider our currency worthy of owning — I wonder what the federal stance should be now.

At some point does having a more-valuable currency have more of a downside than an upside?