Welcome to the October 2006 edition of Beechlog.
Hello, late again! I've been busy with other things and haven't found much time
for writing much, so it's a wonder this issue got out at all. Seriously, after
my move, my connections with radio are diminishing and I hardly know what's
going on (except for how M3s have saved/destroyed the hobby). My shift pattern
seems to ensure that I rarely get to club meetings, so I don't know how all of
you are getting on. So I think it's time for someone else to take over Beechlog.
A new look, articles about radio, you know what's needed. Then I can read Beechlog,
and maybe one day GØHZK/M might appear on the bands.
Roger GØHZK, Editor
Contents
Virtualisation
Chinglish
Fireworks, School Trips and Spinning Discs
Handel and Podcasts
Virtualisation
Not having solved the problem of how to get on the air again, I've had to
content myself with playing with computers. After all the messing about in
the last ussue, My machines have all been working OK, and so have those that
I 'fixed' last time. So I found time to explore an aspect that I've not really
looked at before.
For a good many years, computer processors have been able to work in a slightly
unusual manner. Normally the whole of a CPU is dedicated to the task in hand,
but there is another way they can operate, that is handling quite seperate
processes simultaneously. I don't mean multi-tasking, which is the job of the
software running in a single operating system, but the concept of virtual
machines. Here the CPU is effectively divided up into a number of discrete
processors, each running quite different software, isolated from each other.
For a while there has been software available to exploit this, although the
specialist nature has meant that it has been out of the public gaze. However
recently there has been a number of more polished commercial products available,
at reasonable prices or indeed free. For PC enthusiasts,
Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 has become available as a free download. There is
also
WMware which comes in free and paid for forms.
Here I'll just deal with the Microsoft product. It's a fairly small download,
about 18 megs, and runs in Windows 2000 or XP. It's easy enough to install, and
dead simple to use. All you have to do is create new virtual machines by
specifying the size of virtual disk and amount of virtual memory, then starting
the virtual machine. What you see then is a window with what looks like a PC
bootup sequence, then it stops! So if you put some sort of install disk in your
and restart the virtual machine, click inside its window, then the install will
start from the CD or floppy disk.
I tried this with a number of operating systems. Firstly I installed FreeNAS,
which is a network storage solution which can be installed on any PC, turning
it into a standalone file and FTP server. This software is based on the FreeBSD
Unix core, a simple command-line application. There's not much to see on the PC
that's running it, as most of the configuration is carried out on any PC on the
network, using a web browser. But on the image below you can see the virtual
machine running on my old Windows XP machine. FreeNAS running here has it's
own IP address quite seperate from that of the host Windows machine, the latter
which can access and use FreeNAS as if it were running on remote hardware.
This is one of the uses of this software - you can test out anything else
without having to wipe hard disks etc., as the virtual machine consists just
of a couple of files which can easily be copied or deleted, without upsetting
your main Windows PC. Just for a laugh I created another virtual machine, and
installed Windows 3.1 from floppies. No problem - it just worked! The image
below shows both FreeNAS and Windows 3.1 running together in different
virtual machines.
So here we have 32 bit Windows, with Unix and 16 bit Windows running within it.
This is not emulation, all three operating systems run their own native code
directly accessing the CPU. Of course it's not quite that simple, as some of the
PC hardware is emulated. You can't have three operating systems trying to access
the hardware at the same time, so there are 32 bit Windows processes that
pretend to be the PC bios, sound card, graphics and suchlike. But other than
this, the code is sent unaltered to the CPU, so the speed of these virtual
machines is much faster than emulation.
Virtual machine software is also available for other machines. Apple's switch
to Intel Core processors has meant that more efficient virtual machines can
be constructed. Windows cannot run natively on the old Mac IBM Power PC CPUs,
but was designed for Intel! So software like the
Parallels Desktop
have enabled Windows to run natively inside Mac OS X. Once again you can install
Linux, Unix, DOS, all sorts of Windows, etc., into a Mac Virtual machine. To
test this out, I installed Windows 98 into a Parallels virtual machine, the
picture below shows Windows Explorer and Internet Explorer displaying the BBRC
web site.
Chinglish
Recently there have been reports in the news about the Chinese government's
preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games. In particular they have expressed
concern about the use of Chinglish, which any visitor to the international
cities of China will have seen in shops, on signs and on clothing.
These are basically confusing or amusing translations from Chinese to English.
Chinglish has a long history. Originally it appeared in countries colonised
by the British, such as Hong Kong and Singapore. There it was a sort of Creole
or half-way language, and some phrases have crept into normal English, for
example "long time, no see". In China today it is more often mistranslation.
Chinese words that have more than one meaning are often victims - the use of
a Chinese-English dictionary results in the wrong meaning being translated.
The misunderstanding of English grammar results in some hilarious signs, and
words which just do not exist crop up frequently.

Visitors to China currently accept this as one of the charms of the country, but
the government looks more seriously at the matter. Slowly the signs that say
"The Slippery are very Crafty" are being changed to a more reassuring warning
of slippery road surfaces. However local shops and products still display
much to cause amusement. Somewhere on the net I saw a cafe menu with items
such a "Corrugated Irom Beef" and various dishes featuring "detonation".
Clothing can be quite amusing too. Like in Britain, the Chinese like to display
images on T-Shirts. Since their written language is pictorial, Chinese characters
often crop up instead. These are not meant to be read literally, but have a
pleasing pattern, or are meant to convey an aura of cool or whatever. Some of
these get translated into English, where the effect is not quite the same, but
is often very amusing.
A search for "Chinglish" will reveal many amusing items, and I've nicked some
for you below.




Fireworks, School Trips and Spinning Discs
I'm sitting here late at night, and it's a toss up between doing the washing up,
ironing, or writing this. Getting some sleep is not on, as it appears that today
is Diwali, the Hindu Festival of Lights. In this case, the lights are provided
by fireworks, mostly loud ones.
Diwali is a five day holiday, with most of the action on the day of the new moon,
I guess that's today. The Hindus celebrate Diwali for a variety of reasons. The
Sikhs also celebrate the same day, the anniversary of the day Guru returned to
Amritsar after being released from imprisonment by the Mughal Emperor. In a
couple of weeks it will be November 5th, so I guess this will spill over
'till and beyond firework day. Still not to worry.
I've not been celebrating anything, although last month I earned the right to a
free bus pass. This was once G3 territory, but the requisity number of years have
passed. I've not used it yet, but I have received two free prescriptions, which
at least has saved me some dough. This has marginally offset the cost of my son's
school trip - I took him to the airport to catch the afternoon flight to Osaka.
He went in a party of 15. Apparently on boarding the plane they were all upgraded
to business class seats. I don't know why, maybe the crew thought they'd be better
contained seperate from the rest of the passengers. The 10 day trip is supposed
to help him towards his GCSE Japanese next year, and it's also served to dent
the finances of his parents. His Mum and I watched him check in, and we both
decided he'd never be the same again. That was our little boy.
I felt green with envy. I'm not sure I want to go to Japan, but I resurrected
my idea of going on the day train from Paris to Venice. I know this train exists,
but searches on the web lead mainly to the Orient Express, which is a night train,
so you have to exchange the views through the Alps for posh meals and new clothes
to wear while eating them. I eventually found details. The train leaves at 8.00
from Paris, and arrives late afternoon in Venice. It does this by going at 180mph,
I guess mainly on the bit between Paris and Lyon, I think it must ease off a bit
through the mountains. Unfortunately I was unable to book my ticket, because
whatever I entered in the web form caused an error "you cannot book less than 7
days in advance". Oh well.
I did have a new experience as a result of my birthday - my son bought me a ticket
to the Albert Hall. The concert was an unusual performance marking the centenary
of the birth of Dmitri Shostakovich. Unusual because it was accompanied by film.
A large screen had been hung behind the orchestra. There were two 'songs' (to
use the current digital terminology) - an orchestrated performance of one of
his string quartets, and his 15th Symphony. The former was accompanied by film
and stills of Shostakovich's life, and the latter was mainly scenes of Russia
during the war. There was one curious bit of film showing people trying to sit
on a rotating disk, which eventually shot each one off into the surrounding crowd.
This produced a rumble of laughter - the 15th Symphony is quite dark and
introspective - so it was rather unnerving. Presumably it meant something to
the large numbers of Russians in the audience. The symphony was supposed to be
about the bombing of Dresden and other horrors, but was really thought to be
descriptive of life in Soviet Russia under Joe Stalin. Shostakovich was wise
not to enlighten anyone, but reference in the music to Wagner, and oddly Rossini's
William Tell have led to all sorts of interpretations.
Still, it was good to hear a full orchestra with lots of percussion - Timpani,
Glockenspeil, Castanets, bloody great drums, Cymbals, and a Celesta, an instrument that
looked like a wicker upright piano (as heard in the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy).
A full complement of eight double basses, a huge-looking tuba, as well as the
usual instruments. I now have a reference to what a big orchestra should sound like!
I walked back to the Tube along with crowds of the decorous London night people,
in particular I noted a young lady in a furry white polka dot cowboy outfit, and
plenty of others in slightly less flamboyant clothes. Earlier in the evening
the setting sun illuminated the City and the bridges along the Thames, viewed
from waterloo Bridge, was very photogenic, which was why I left my camera at home.
Handel and Podcasts
I wrote recently about listening to 'radio stations' on a PC, but during the
last few months I've been exploiting another technology, Podcasts. When I first
read about these, some years ago, I couldn't figure out why anyone would be
interested. But after idly trying a few, I suppose I'm now addicted.
There's nothing special about podcasts, after all they are just standard audio
files. The delivery method can be different, but is really only a simple means
of keeping up to date and getting the files onto your player. The process of
'subscribing' is just a means of automatically downloading the files as they are
published. You don't have to do this - you can just download them at will. I
get mine via iTunes, which collates all the stuff into one place, so you can
just browse the lists and pick what you fancy. There are other applications
available, or you can just go to the websites and get the files in the usual
way.
Most of my listening is done at work, especially on the long lonely late shifts.
No-one talks much after about 7pm, so I bring my own entertainment! There is a
wide selection of stuff about, from all over the world. Some of the podcasts are
simply repackaged radio broadcasts, and others are created
specifically for the media. There is a wide range of 'professionalism' from
programmes created by established broadcasters using well-know journalists and
presenters, to stuff knocked up in someones back room. The former group include
dozens of BBC programs - including programs I would never be around to listen to.
The latter are indeed a curious mix, and often have an unexpected charm of their
own - you're not likely to hear these programmes any other way.
It's often interesting to compare UK broadcasters with those from the USA and
Australia, for there are quite different styles. And the 'home made' group have
an even more marked difference. While American producers seem to try to mimic
their professional counterparts, it's not that way with the British stuff. I
suppose it doesn't appeal to everyone, but the British presenters don't take
themselves so seriously! For example there's Will Green's
'British Mac'.
Now there are loads of US Mac podcasts, often very similar in content and delivery.
Wills podcasts start with Michael Caine's countdown from The Italian Job, followed
by Rule Britannia. Will reminds me of a certain BBRC member. His slightly
hesitant manner, and sometimes apparent lack of knowledge about his subject, is
very addictive. Unlike the professionals, he doesn't seem to bother much about
the niceties of copyright protection (this aspect is most frustrating in the
professional podcasts), and anything can turn up. Recently we had a long dialog
from Julian and Sandy (from Round the Horne - some of you might be old enough to
remember them), and Peter Sellers and a George Formby contest have cropped up too.
Nothing to do with Macs of course.
Another one I tried recently is the Wiggly Wigglers. Heather, Richard, Phil, Monty, etc., are
very enthusiastic, bordering on the totally insane, rather like Will Green. It
took me ages to figure out what it was all about, and even so I had to study the
web site to see whether it was real or not. Marvellous stuff.
I mentioned the copyright problem, which applies in particular to the more
professional podcasts. As you might expect, you're not going to find full
recordings of well known music here, especially as these downloads are free
(you don't think I'd pay, do you?). For programs about current affairs, science,
technology, etc., this isn't really important. But it does rather limit the
scope of music programs. In some cases they manage OK, like in the BBC series
Discovering Music. These are long programs recorded with an orchestra, so there
are frequent small snippets of music which illustrate technique, themes, etc.
But the complete performances that conclude these programs have been removed.
If you like British/Irish Folk music, the situation is better. Since these
musicians are less mercenary there are complete performances, although often
from less well-known performers. The same with independent new popular music,
where performers are more keen on getting known, and publicising albums, than
collecting every penny in royalties.
Now on to Handel. While I was up in London for the Shostakovich concert, I
popped into Oxford Street's HMV shop. Go downstairs and through the door into
the classical section, and it's an Aladdins Cave of music you never knew had been
recorded. I picked up two double albums for less than £10 each.
The Triumph of Time and Truth is one of Handel's lesser known compositions. I
heard some of it on the radio about twenty years ago, but had never found a
recording. It was written as a public entertainment, and this Hyperion recording
was made in 1982. It's absolutely wonderful, but most record shops have heard
only of the Messiah and Water Music, so it's no surprise I hadn't found it earlier.
Speaking of the Messiah, the other recording is brand new, and is
of the 1751 version. Handel produced the Messiah many times in London, and this
version stands out because he replaced the sopranos and altos with trebles and
countertenors. I heard a bit of this on the radio recently and was spellbound.
It was recorded on Naxos by the Academy of Ancient Music and the Choir of New
College, Oxford. The three boys who sing the treble parts were aged 11, 12 and 13
but sing so wonderfully. It's hard to believe, especially in the duet with the
countertenor. Trebles are rarely heard in concerts, as their singing career (as
treble) is very short - after 13 the voice breaks and it can be years before they
develop a good tenor or bass technique. But these boys start in the choir at age
8, and here they are singing solos just a few years later. I suppose it is true
that they can never become as accomplished as conventional voices, time is not
on their side, but the purity of voice is seldom matched by sopranos. In my
opinion anyway. The only place you are likely to hear these youngsters is in
a C of E cathedral choir. I managed to hear such a choir singing at Canterbury
earlier this year. This is something uniquely British. Continental choirs are
quite different. Even the singing at the Requium Mass at the Vatican a while ago
was not of the same standard of that at Charlie and Camilla's wedding the
following day. But there you are. I'm not normal, I suppose, like Will Green
and The Wiggly Wiggler team. New Beechlog Editor required.
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