NathanWiegand.com

Moved

So, Blogger decided to discontinue the SFTP service. Thus, this blog cannot exist as it did. I've decided to move to a wordpress blog. It suits my needs to control my settings and install my own plugins. So, here it is:
http://nathanwiegand.com/wp/

LaTeX fun

The internets recently informed me that Google Charts can generate images from LaTeX math! This is a godsend. Previously, I had been either just creating a LaTeX document, building the PDF, and copy-pasting the bit I wanted, or using one of the many online tools. Unfortunately, neither of these are very robust, especially when I want to resize things.

So, let's say I want to insert a combination: ${n \choose k}$ . You can just use the url http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=tx&chf=bg,s,FFFFFF00&chs=NaNxNaN&chco=000000&chl=%7Bn%20%5Cchoose%20k%7D. But this would get tedious quickly. So, I've developed a tool which allows you to enter the LaTeX math in your usual way and will also let you easily resize the image generated.

So, ${n \choose k}$ becomes ${n \choose k}$ becomes ${n \choose k}$ .

For good measure, here's the binomial theorem:
$\sum_{k=0}^n{n\choose k} (ax)^{n-k}b^k = a^nx^n + a^{n-1}bx^{n-1}+ \ldots+ab^{n-1}x + b^n = (ax + b) ^n$

LaTeX Math to image tool

ICFP

I finally got around to uploading some pictures from Edinburgh, Scotland.

Flickr Stream

The ICFP was amazing. I didn't miss a paper. Luckily, you can see them all too: ICFP on Vimeo.

I came across this quote on the web the other day. It makes me happy:

You say "looks like somebody has too much time on their hands" but all I hear is "I'm sad because I don't know what creativity feels like."

Dan Wineman on Twitter

I'll try to post pics of Scotland and some stuff I've been working on this week. Look forward to Funion!

Damn right.

I saw this on the intertubes today and had to post it for two reasons: your enjoyment, and so that I don't lose it!

TwitParty.

TwitParty is the realization of an idea I had this weekend to marry the fun of Translation Party and Twitter. For a long time I had been wanting to build something for Google AppEngine. So, to take a break from writing a journal article and my syllabus, Tuesday night I began writing TwitParty. Then, 23 hours later (yes, I slept) it was live! If nothing else, I think this might be the prettiest website I've ever developed.

About

Hosted on Google AppEngine

Authenticates to Twitter via OAuth. From the site: "An open protocol to allow secure API authorization in a simple and standard method from desktop and web applications."

'Garbles' messages by taking your text in some input language (default English) and translating it to and from the garbling language (default Japanese) until the text stops changing. Sometimes this can go on for a surprisingly long time, so I've set the maximum number of attempts at 20.

Displays the live #twitparty feed. This was originally done with an AJAX script that took the JSON output from a Twitter search and displayed it. That is until a friend pointed out that Twitter has a blessed widget that fit the bill perfectly and already looked nice.

Please leave any questions or comments about TwitParty below.

Lake Nickol

img_2393
Originally uploaded by nathanwiegand

Leah and I took a break from research today and spent some time exploring Tuscaloosa. This photo was taken below the spillway of Lake Nickol. It's amazing how you can live somewhere for so long and still discover new things.

Friday, February 5, 2010

Moved

Thursday, December 10, 2009

LaTeX fun

LaTeX Math to image tool

Monday, October 19, 2009

ICFP

Sunday, October 11, 2009

Sunday, August 16, 2009

Damn right.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

TwitParty.

About

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Lake Nickol

Recent Posts

Archives