Munich’s botanic garden at Nymphenburg palace is currently showing off live tropical butterflies in one of its rooms. So naturally I got my macro lens and see what I could shoot, also adding some orchids (and turtles) from another room. I should say that I don’t actually have a clue about any of these subjects, … Continue reading “Botanic Garden Butterflies”
Moon Shot Shootout
Ever since I got my Sony DSC-HX90 with its 720 mm optical zoom range (albeit restricted to an equivalent f/37.4 at the high end due to the small sensor) I wondered if heavy expensive long lenses on my full-frame Sony Alpha 7R II were any use at all, given that I generally only use them … Continue reading “Moon Shot Shootout”
Greatest Hits in 2019
Total Kynosarges page views as determined by Google Analytics shrank rapidly year-over-year on both weblog and website, and would be worse if not for two surprisingly popular posts that have nothing to do with programming. The reasons are as usual: my traditionally most popular subjects – Windows DPI scaling, .NET/WPF and JavaFX development – are … Continue reading “Greatest Hits in 2019”
Programmer’s Guide to Theory
The Programmer’s Guide to Theory by Mike James (IO Press 2019, ISBN 978-1-871-9624-37) is intended for programmers who haven’t studied computer science but are planning to, or are simply interested in the ideas taught there. Mike James is an editor and frequent contributor at I Programmer who has a PhD in computer science. I cannot … Continue reading “Programmer’s Guide to Theory”
The Holy Roman Empire
The Holy Roman Empire: A Thousand Years of Europe’s History by Peter H. Wilson (Penguin Books 2017, ISBN 978-0-141-04747-8) is an astonishing thousand-page tome of which about 300 pages are devoted to maps, color plates, family trees, chronology, glossary, and an enormous index. I’m not aware of anyone doubting the thoroughness or scholarly quality of … Continue reading “The Holy Roman Empire”
The Rats of Nationalism
Brandon Adamson has recently published a new book, The Rats of Nationalism, concerning the Internet (mostly really Twitter) presence of alternative right movements in America. Everyone who sees the title is bound to be confused. It’s not about calling nationalists “rats” in a derogatory sense, nor really about nationalists ratting out on each other, though … Continue reading “The Rats of Nationalism”
Microsoft Surface Laptop 2
It’s blue! It’s handsome! It’s the laptop everyone loves! Like apparently a lot of other people I got a Microsoft Surface Laptop 2 last week, as I once again needed a portable Windows device. So far my impressions are very positive with the exception of a horrendous Windows update experience, which will probably surprise no … Continue reading “Microsoft Surface Laptop 2”
Swing Hyperlink Labels
JavaFX has a convenient Hyperlink control that’s functionally a button styled as an underlined label, just like an HTML hyperlink. Java Swing has clickable hyperlinks in its JEditorPane control but does not provide them as a separate lightweight control. Fortunately it’s quite easy to roll your own, and that’s what the code below does. JHyperlink … Continue reading “Swing Hyperlink Labels”
Vertical Swing Labels
One limitation of Java AWT/Swing is the inability to rotate controls such as labels, although you can freely rotate elements in a custom-drawn graphics context. I did try invoking a label’s paint method in a paintComponent override after rotating the graphics context but couldn’t get it to work, probably because of the label’s built-in assumptions … Continue reading “Vertical Swing Labels”
Moskau, Moskau!
Dschinghis Khan is a German (but really multi-national) disco band formed in Munich by prolific producer Ralph Siegel in 1979, competing in that year’s Eurovision song contest with an eponymous song that reached fourth place. So much, so amusing and irrelevant. Except then something else happened. Still in 1979, the band released Moskau. That was … Continue reading “Moskau, Moskau!”