ls -lart Projects && remember

[fivemack]

that it is not the beginning of the work, but the continuation thereof until it be thoroughly finished, that yieldeth the true glory

[which I remember as a commonly-used prayer at school, but cannot find through Google; on the other hand, of all the organisations of the Earth, my secondary school is among those whose possession of a totally independent prayer-book would be considered least surprising]

drwxr-xr-x     4 tom  tom    136 Feb  4  2005 mandy
drwxrwxrwx    11 tom  tom    374 Feb  6  2005 Spheres in a cube
drwxrwxrwx   286 tom  tom   9724 Feb  6  2005 FRACTREE
drwxr-xr-x    12 tom  tom    408 Feb 11  2005 fixedprec
drwxr-xr-x    16 tom  tom    544 Mar 15  2005 random_graph
drwxr-xr-x     6 tom  tom    204 Mar 17  2005 enceladus
drwxrwxrwx    31 tom  tom   1054 Mar 17  2005 orbital
drwxr-xr-x    68 tom  tom   2312 Mar 25  2005 srtm
drwxr-xr-x    31 tom  tom   1054 Mar 31  2005 pentagon
drwxr-xr-x    15 tom  tom    510 Apr 19 19:55 crt-fft
drwxr-xr-x    18 tom  tom    612 Apr 19 21:17 primestrings
drwxr-xr-x    15 tom  tom    510 Apr 25 21:42 irreducible
drwxr-xr-x     7 tom  tom    238 May  2 22:36 streetmap
drwxrwxrwx    24 tom  tom    816 Jun  3 21:08 repel
drwxr-xr-x    64 tom  tom   2176 Jun 13 19:09 optbin
drwxr-xr-x     7 tom  tom    238 Jun 19 19:19 mmxsort
drwxr-xr-x    12 tom  tom    408 Jun 23 21:08 eurcit
drwxr-xr-x    13 tom  tom    442 Jun 23 23:09 demographic
drwxr-xr-x    10 tom  tom    340 Jun 29 10:10 smallres
drwxr-xr-x     7 tom  tom    238 Jun 29 11:34 squareful
drwxr-xr-x     9 tom  tom    306 Aug  1 19:40 connected
-rw-r--r--     1 tom  tom   1276 Aug 14 11:12 ling.cpp
-rwxr-xr-x     1 tom  tom  29160 Aug 14 14:33 a.out
-rw-r--r--     1 tom  tom   1769 Aug 14 14:34 ling2.cpp
drwxr-xr-x    41 tom  tom   1394 Aug 22 23:18 haskell_stuff
drwxr-xr-x     8 tom  tom    272 Sep 15 19:59 primefilt
drwxr-xr-x    21 tom  tom    714 Sep 28 23:25 kylix
drwxr-xr-x     8 tom  tom    272 Oct  8 22:22 dudcc
drwxr-xr-x    28 tom  tom    952 Oct 12 00:42 diffeq

Not one of them even close to finished, though I can remember nearly all of their goals; and there are more on the other computer. Some I've worked at intensely for one evening, some for a week of evenings; I don't know how many of them would take much more than a month of evenings to complete, or be worth the effort once completed.

Comments

[scat0324.livejournal.com]

which I remember as a commonly-used prayer at school

Attributed to Sir Francis Drake:


When thou givest to thy servants
to endeavour any great matter
Grant us also to know that it is not the beginning
but the continuing of the same unto the end
until it be thoroughly finished
which yieldeth the true glory.

[kaet.livejournal.com]

Hey, I worked on the a.out project, too. Perhaps we should share development work? :).

[jojomojo.livejournal.com]

What's dud_cc? :)

SURPRISINGNESS THEORY 1)

[(Anonymous)]

SURPRINGNESS THEORY:
-----------------------
Written on 4am, Saturday 15th October 2005 after waking up with the germ of the theory buzzing in my

mind. It had to be written down.



This note describes the motivation and basis for making mathematical our heuristic notion of how

surprising (or credible) a day, month or year in the life of someone is. This will give us an

mathematical tool to give a credibility score to stories told us by people we know. Is someone taking

too many sick days? Do too many flukish events happen to a given person to be credible? Is someone

pulling the wool over our eyes? We want to know this. Governments and industry want to know this. Our

bosses want to know this. If this notion of the credibility score turns out to have statistical

validity then its applications are endless. No more will people be able to lie and tell tall stories

and get away with it.

This note was inspired by a female friend I shall call Pamela. We were friends for six months from

Jan to June 2005 and she told me many unlikely stories about her life, each one surprising, but in

totality they seemed quite incredible. I pondered how I could use my mathematical skills to draw a

line in the sand and say, "any more tall stories Pamela and I do not believe you any more - I am 95%

confident that you are lying to me." I had to discount the possibility that she is merely a unlucky/

amazing / unusual person. This note is an attempt to make that vision reality.

EXAMPLE
---------

I knew Pamela for six months. During that time she told me:
S1) she was a psychiatrist
S2) she was Indian in origin
S3) she had parents divorced
E4) she got chicken pox in the second week i knew her at age of 26.
E5) her builder fell off a ladder just before doing her patio
S6) she had a fear of acquaintances falling off ladders
S7)her brother studied maths at cambridge like I had and studied to be an actuarial trainee like me

and was very IT literate like I am supposed to be.
E8)she had had a car accident last year which left her with back trouble
S10) she was only the second girl corresponded with on match.com and she immediately asked that I

ring her.
S11) she was a house owner
S12) both her parents were doctors
E13) she drove her car into her builder's van last year and he was unhappy about that.