Gerard's Blog

Ok, I Get It - Ruby Is Lightweight

Lightweight, simple, elegant, beautiful. Okay, I get it, rubyists. Your stuff is lightweight. I am all for lightweight - ohhhh, believe me I'm for it - but do you have to be so obnoxious about it? It seems that everything written in, associated with, or that requires Ruby all use the same words.

But just saying something is lightweight does not make it so. And those that make something lightweight must be careful not to make it so lightweight that it's useless. (BTW, as easy-to-use as Rails claims to be, I've seen some pretty fucked up configurations involving Mongrel, mod_proxy, Pound and who the hell knows what else. And this is supposed to be easier than mod_php?)

I probably shouldn't be saying these things, as I'm not familiar with the Ruby world. But it's just something I noticed after seeing Ruby solution after Ruby solution pop up.

Most times I've adopted a technology or application, it's because of a clearly-defined need. As many times as I've tried to pick up Ruby, I just haven't found a reason to yet.

Read My Blog! Make Yourself Smarter!

I usually wouldn't put these little badge things on my blog, but I couldn't resist this one.

Statistics 101

The latest crime rankings making the rounds ("City Crime Rankings: Crime in Metropolitan America", published by CQ Press), that ranks Cincinnati as the 16th most dangerous city in the nation, is so statistically unsound, they might as well have placed all the cities in a hat and drawn names to get the rankings. The AP article already mentions two flaws, and I'll add another one:

Different states define different crimes in different ways. So right there your data point is inconsistent.
The study assigned a crime rate score to each city with zero representing the national average, but the study excluded Chicago, Minneapolis, and other Illinois and Minnesota cities. What kind of average is that? That's like finding the average income in America and leaving Bill Gates out (which by the way is why median is usually more useful).
The FBI crime data the study uses is based on per-capita crime. But in metro cities that have annexed surrounding suburbs such as Indianapolis, Columbus, and Louisville, the per-capita crime rate will always be lower than cities like Cincinnati.

I couldn't agree more with the FBI response on the findings: "Consequently, they lead to simplistic and/or incomplete analyses that often create misleading perceptions adversely affecting communities and their residents."

Cincinnati takes another hit.

I Love/Hate Chris Henry

Busy weekend! Sarah and I got tickets to the Bengals vs. Cardinals game from Mike. They outplayed the Cardinals, but with two interceptions returned for touchdowns, it's hard to win. Chris Henry hauled in a 30-some yard TD pass today, but he has got to be the pansiest receiver in the NFL. Whenever he feels like he's going to get hit, he drops the ball. He killed two drives today by dropping two balls that hit his hands. One was over the middle. One was on the sideline, but his back was upfield and he felt the DB coming before catching the ball.

And my stitched panorama didn't turn out so well in the cloudy weather.

Urban Planning 101

On the way back to my car, I snapped this picture standing in-between 2nd and 3rd Sts.

Not to beat a dead horse, but I just love how the neighborhood around the ballpark has taken off ever since they decided to build it on the river. So many lively bars and restaurants.

Of course, by "neighborhood" I mean "12 lanes of highway," and by "lively bars and restaurants" I mean "homeless living underneath the bridges." But whatever.

Joe Nuxhall R.I.P.

When I heard the news about Joe Nuxhall on Friday morning, I cringed a bit, and felt a wave of sadness pass through me. I went down to the ballpark - not sure why - maybe for no other reason than because it was a clear morning.

News crews were already down there doing location spots.

On Saturday afternoon, Sarah and I went for a walk and ended up back at the ballpark. By that time, the memorial had grown.

At some point, this guy from 700WLW with a handheld DVR asked me a few questions. You can see more of my salient thoughts on the video here.

Rest in peace, ol' lefthander.