X-Git-Url: http://pere.pagekite.me/gitweb/homepage.git/blobdiff_plain/dfb95fbf632f9da5dc11eed5372f75cdd74da056..b5795b8c827d8036eda9cc18a490f4356f8832be:/blog/index.rss diff --git a/blog/index.rss b/blog/index.rss index 6d9d6a18cf..477f484f67 100644 --- a/blog/index.rss +++ b/blog/index.rss @@ -6,6 +6,89 @@ http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/ + + Book cover for the Free Culture book finally done + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Book_cover_for_the_Free_Culture_book_finally_done.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Book_cover_for_the_Free_Culture_book_finally_done.html + Thu, 3 Sep 2015 21:00:00 +0200 + <p>Creating a good looking book cover proved harder than I expected. +I wanted to create a cover looking similar to the original cover of +the +<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/free-culture-lessig">Free +Culture</a> book we are translating to Norwegian, and I wanted it in +vector format for high resolution printing. But my inkscape knowledge +were not nearly good enough to pull that off. + +<p>But thanks to the great inkscape community, I was able to wrap up +the cover yesterday evening. I asked on the +<a href="irc://irc.freenode.net/%23inkscape">#inkscape IRC channel</a> +on Freenode for help and clues, and Marc Jeanmougin (Mc-) volunteered +to try to recreate it based on the PDF of the cover from the HTML +version. Not only did he create a +<a href="https://marc.jeanmougin.fr/share/copy1.svg ">SVG document with +the original and his vector version side by side</a>, he even provided +an <a href="https://marc.jeanmougin.fr/share/out-1.ogv">instruction +video</a> explaining how he did it</a>. But the instruction video is +not easy to follow for an untrained inkscape user. The video is a +recording on how he did it, and he is obviously very experienced as +the menu selections are very quick and he mentioned on IRC that he did +use some keyboard shortcuts that can't be seen on the video, but it +give a good idea about the inkscape operations to use to create the +stripes with the embossed copyright sign in the center.</p> + +<p>I took his SVG file, copied the vector image and re-sized it to fit +on the cover I was drawing. I am happy with the end result, and the +current english version look like this:</p> + +<img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-09-03-free-culture-cover.png" width="70%" align="center"/> + +<p>I am not quite sure about the text on the back, but guess it will +do. I picked three quotes from the official site for the book, and +hope it will work to trigger the interest of potential readers. The +Norwegian cover will look the same, but with the texts and bar code +replaced with the Norwegian version.</p> + +<p>The book is very close to being ready for publication, and I expect +to upload the final draft to Lulu in the next few days and order a +final proof reading copy to verify that everything look like it should +before allowing everyone to order their own copy of Free Culture, in +English or Norwegian Bokmål. I'm waiting to give the the productive +proof readers a chance to complete their work.</p> + + + + + In my hand, a pocket book edition of the Norwegian Free Culture book! + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/In_my_hand__a_pocket_book_edition_of_the_Norwegian_Free_Culture_book_.html + http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/In_my_hand__a_pocket_book_edition_of_the_Norwegian_Free_Culture_book_.html + Wed, 19 Aug 2015 22:10:00 +0200 + <p>Today, finally, my first printed draft edition of the Norwegian +translation of Free Culture I have been working on for the last few +years arrived in the mail. I had to fake a cover to get the interior +printed, and the exterior of the book look awful, but that is +irrelevant at this point. I asked for a printed pocket book version +to get an idea about the font sizes and paper format as well as how +good the figures and images look in print, but also to test what the +pocket book version would look like. After receiving the 500 page +pocket book, it became obvious to me that that pocket book size is too +small for this book. I believe the book is too thick, and several +tables and figures do not look good in the size they get with that +small page sizes. I believe I will go with the 5.5x8.5 inch size +instead. A surprise discovery from the paper version was how bad the +URLs look in print. They are very hard to read in the colophon page. +The URLs are red in the PDF, but light gray on paper. I need to +change the color of links somehow to look better. But there is a +printed book in my hand, and it feels great. :)</p> + +<p>Now I only need to fix the cover, wrap up the postscript with the +store behind the book, and collect the last corrections from the proof +readers before the book is ready for proper printing. Cover artists +willing to work for free and create a Creative Commons licensed vector +file looking similar to the original is most welcome, as my skills as +a graphics designer are mostly missing.</p> + + + First paper version of the Norwegian Free Culture book heading my way http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/First_paper_version_of_the_Norwegian_Free_Culture_book_heading_my_way.html @@ -714,133 +797,5 @@ innholdet.</p> - - Graphing the Norwegian company ownership structure - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Graphing_the_Norwegian_company_ownership_structure.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Graphing_the_Norwegian_company_ownership_structure.html - Mon, 15 Jun 2015 14:00:00 +0200 - <p>It is a bit work to figure out the ownership structure of companies -in Norway. The information is publicly available, but one need to -recursively look up ownership for all owners to figure out the complete -ownership graph of a given set of companies. To save me the work in -the future, I wrote a script to do this automatically, outputting the -ownership structure using the Graphviz/dotty format. The data source -is web scraping from <a href="http://www.proff.no/">Proff</a>, because -I failed to find a useful source directly from the official keepers of -the ownership data, <a href="http://www.brreg.no/">Brønnøysundsregistrene</a>.</p> - -<p>To get an ownership graph for a set of companies, fetch -<a href="https://github.com/petterreinholdtsen/brreg-norway-ownership-graph">the code from git</a> and run it using the organisation number. I'm -using the Norwegian newspaper Dagbladet as an example here, as its -ownership structure is very simple:</p> - -<pre> -% time ./bin/eierskap-dotty 958033540 > dagbladet.dot - -real 0m2.841s -user 0m0.184s -sys 0m0.036s -% -</pre> - -<p>The script accept several organisation numbers on the command line, -allowing a cluster of companies to be graphed in the same image. The -resulting dot file for the example above look like this. The edges -are labeled with the ownership percentage, and the nodes uses the -organisation number as their name and the name as the label:</p> - -<pre> -digraph ownership { -rankdir = LR; -"Aller Holding A/s" -> "910119877" [label="100%"] -"910119877" -> "998689015" [label="100%"] -"998689015" -> "958033540" [label="99%"] -"974530600" -> "958033540" [label="1%"] -"958033540" [label="AS DAGBLADET"] -"998689015" [label="Berner Media Holding AS"] -"974530600" [label="Dagbladets Stiftelse"] -"910119877" [label="Aller Media AS"] -} -</pre> - -<p>To view the ownership graph, run "<tt>dotty dagbladet.dot</tt>" or -convert it to a PNG using "<tt>dot -T png dagbladet.dot > -dagbladet.png</tt>". The result can be seen below:</p> - -<img src="http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/images/2015-06-15-ownership-graphs-norway-dagbladet.png" width="80%"> - -<p>Note that I suspect the "Aller Holding A/S" entry to be incorrect -data in the official ownership register, as that name is not -registered in the official company register for Norway. The ownership -register is sensitive to typos and there seem to be no strict checking -of the ownership links.</p> - -<p>Let me know if you improve the script or find better data sources. -The code is licensed according to GPL 2 or newer.</p> - -<p>Update 2015-06-15: Since the initial post I've been told that -"<a href="http://www.proff.dk/firma/carl-allers-etablissement-aktieselskab/københavn-v/hovedkontorer/13624518-3/">Aller -Holding A/S</a>" is a Danish company, which explain why it did not -have a Norwegian organisation number. I've also been told that there -is a <a href="http://www.brreg.no/automatiske/webservices/">web -services API available</a> from Brønnøysundsregistrene, for those -willing to accept the terms or pay the price.</p> - - - - - Measuring and adjusting the loudness of a TV channel using bs1770gain - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Measuring_and_adjusting_the_loudness_of_a_TV_channel_using_bs1770gain.html - http://people.skolelinux.org/pere/blog/Measuring_and_adjusting_the_loudness_of_a_TV_channel_using_bs1770gain.html - Thu, 11 Jun 2015 13:40:00 +0200 - <p>Television loudness is the source of frustration for viewers -everywhere. Some channels are very load, others are less loud, and -ads tend to shout very high to get the attention of the viewers, and -the viewers do not like this. This fact is well known to the TV -channels. See for example the BBC white paper -"<a href="http://downloads.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp-pdf-files/WHP202.pdf">Terminology -for loudness and level dBTP, LU, and all that</a>" from 2011 for a -summary of the problem domain. To better address the need for even -loadness, the TV channels got together several years ago to agree on a -new way to measure loudness in digital files as one step in -standardizing loudness. From this came the ITU-R standard BS.1770, -"<a href="http://www.itu.int/rec/R-REC-BS.1770/en">Algorithms to -measure audio programme loudness and true-peak audio level</a>".</p> - -<p>The ITU-R BS.1770 specification describe an algorithm to measure -loadness in LUFS (Loudness Units, referenced to Full Scale). But -having a way to measure is not enough. To get the same loudness -across TV channels, one also need to decide which value to standardize -on. For European TV channels, this was done in the EBU Recommondaton -R128, "<a href="https://tech.ebu.ch/docs/r/r128.pdf">Loudness -normalisation and permitted maximum level of audio signals</a>", which -specifies a recommended level of -23 LUFS. In Norway, I have been -told that NRK, TV2, MTG and SBS have decided among themselves to -follow the R128 recommondation for playout from 2016-03-01.</p> - -<p>There are free software available to measure and adjust the loudness -level using the LUFS. In Debian, I am aware of a library named -<a href="https://tracker.debian.org/pkg/libebur128">libebur128</a> -able to measure the loudness and since yesterday morning a new binary -named <a href="http://bs1770gain.sourceforge.net">bs1770gain</a> -capable of both measuring and adjusting was uploaded and is waiting -for NEW processing. I plan to maintain the latter in Debian under the -<a href="https://qa.debian.org/developer.php?email=pkg-multimedia-maintainers%40lists.alioth.debian.org">Debian -multimedia</a> umbrella.</p> - -<p>The free software based TV channel I am involved in, -<a href="http://www.frikanalen.no/">Frikanalen</a>, plan to follow the -R128 recommondation ourself as soon as we can adjust the software to -do so, and the bs1770gain tool seem like a good fit for that part of -the puzzle to measure loudness on new video uploaded to Frikanalen. -Personally, I plan to use bs1770gain to adjust the loudness of videos -I upload to Frikanalen on behalf of <a href="http://www.nuug.no/">the -NUUG member organisation</a>. The program seem to be able to measure -the LUFS value of any media file handled by ffmpeg, but I've only -successfully adjusted the LUFS value of WAV files. I suspect it -should be able to adjust it for all the formats handled by ffmpeg.</p> - - -