Welcome to Argalax

Hi, my name is Alexander and this is my website.

It describes my work, hobbies, various projects, intellectual pursuits, current interests, and whatever else seems important and/or interesting at the moment.

I live in Canada, just east of Toronto, and work as technical team leader in the IT industry.

In spare time I enjoy writing some code, developing web applications, working on my robot, and FreeBSD/Linux projects, reading sci-fi, finance and technical books, building my cabin in the wilderness and travel when I can.

Here are some technical news to read...

Technology

Facebook shares see modest debut [Fri, 18 May 2012 20:49:36 GMT]
Facebook shares end a volatile first day of trading at $38.23, barely above the company's initial pricing, having initially jumped more than 10%.

Met Police to extract phone data [Thu, 17 May 2012 17:20:49 GMT]
Mobile phone data of suspects in police custody is to be extracted and retained, regardless of whether charges are brought, the BBC has learned.

Silicon trick for next-gen memory [Fri, 18 May 2012 11:09:37 GMT]
Researchers reveal details of a promising way to make a fundamentally different kind of computer memory chip.

Twitter backs web privacy effort [Fri, 18 May 2012 12:20:49 GMT]
Micro-blogging service Twitter will support an initiative that lets people browse the web without being monitored.

Anonymous attacks Indian websites [Fri, 18 May 2012 10:44:47 GMT]
Hacker group Anonymous has carried out a series of attacks against government and political websites in India.

Computer game for stroke patients [Thu, 17 May 2012 13:10:02 GMT]
Newcastle University helps to develop a computer game to help those who have suffered strokes.

Government to miss cookie cut-off [Wed, 16 May 2012 23:07:04 GMT]
Most government websites will miss the UK's deadline for complying with EU regulations over cookies, the Cabinet Office tells the BBC.

China Mobile in talks with Apple [Thu, 17 May 2012 10:17:50 GMT]
China Mobile, the main mobile service provider in China and the largest in the world by users, could soon offer its customers Apple's iPhone.

Government may miss cloud targets [Thu, 17 May 2012 17:25:50 GMT]
The Government may miss its cloud computing targets because of a lack of enthusiasm from public sector IT staff, a report suggests.

Japan launches S Korea satellite [Fri, 18 May 2012 02:07:48 GMT]
Japan completes its first successful commercial launch of a foreign-made satellite early on Friday, marking its entry into the launch business.

Science

SpaceX readies historic mission [Fri, 18 May 2012 09:37:28 GMT]
The first privately operated delivery to the space station is set to open a new era in human spaceflight

Silicon trick for next-gen memory [Fri, 18 May 2012 11:09:37 GMT]
Researchers reveal details of a promising way to make a fundamentally different kind of computer memory chip.

Japan urges cuts in power usage [Fri, 18 May 2012 09:26:20 GMT]
Japan urges businesses and households to cut electricity use by up to 15% to avoid possible blackouts.

Wild spring weather baffles bugs [Fri, 18 May 2012 02:09:53 GMT]
The wettest April in more than a century has caused problems for many UK butterflies, bees and other bugs, say conservationists.

Contamination at Kinloss probed [Fri, 18 May 2012 16:46:25 GMT]
RAF Kinloss is the focus of a new probe into radioactive contamination, linked to the use of "glow in the dark" paint on WWII aircraft.

'Superflares' from stars counted [Thu, 17 May 2012 13:37:09 GMT]
Nasa's Kepler space telescope provides new insight on the colossal explosions that can occur in the atmospheres of some stars.

UK retains strict animal test law [Thu, 17 May 2012 13:23:22 GMT]
The UK says it will retain stricter animal testing standards than required by a new European Union Directive.

Citizen science yields moth data [Thu, 17 May 2012 10:03:52 GMT]
About 13,000 moths are captured and recorded by citizen scientists in a project described as the largest of its kind.

Whales can adjust their hearing [Thu, 17 May 2012 06:19:51 GMT]
Whales that use sound to navigate are able to adjust the sensitivity of their hearing to protect their ears from loud noises, say scientists.

App Development

LibreOffice Stabilizes []
From the blogs: : Document Foundation proved this week that it's not just a fork in the road for OpenOffice - it's a new direction.

Couchbase Improves NoSQL Performance []
CouchDB open source NoSQL database get a major tech infusion geared around speed.

Mozilla Accelerates HTTP in Firefox 5 []
From the blogs: Being SPDY, isn't about embracing Google, sometimes it's just about being smart with HTTP.

ActiveState Expands Perl Cloud Tech []
Perl cloud vendor run by a 15 year old entrepreneur gets snapped up.

Varnish Cache 3.0 Gets Modular []
New release of popular open source caching technology adds modules and streaming support.