East Palo Alto gun violence

Sad stuff. I sometimes ride my bike within a couple of blocks of all of these locations.

Inverted U rack catalog photo

This catalog photo comes from Highland Products Group. Just because you manufacture and sell something doesn't mean you know how they're supposed to be used.

The whole point of inverted U racks is to provide two points of contact for the bicycle. This means proper parking is parallel to the rack, not perpendicular as shown in this photo.
Photo info: Bad catalog photo by richardmasoner.

Beaverton cyclist arrested for road rage

Beaverton, Oregon bike-rider Dan Koch intentionally rammed a car and was arrested for disorderly conduct, according to witnesses. Question: When's the last time a motorist was arrested for running cyclists off the road?

Bicycle news

Finnish opera singer Esa Ruuttunen was riding his bicycle to rehearsal when a squirrel ran into Esa's bike spokes. The singer suffered a concussion and broken nose. The squirrel died. There's no report on how the bicycle fared in the accident.

On August 16, New York Governor Pataki ratified Assembly Bill A04914, which authorizes the mandatory revocation or suspension of a driver's license where a right-of-way violation leads to serious injury or death of another person. The bill also authorizes courts to require persons convicted of such right-of-way violations that caused serious physical injury or death to participate in a motor vehicle crash prevention course.
Photo info: strange but true bike arrest by BikePortland.org.

Work with Fritz

There's an open job in my group, which does Virtualization Software bringup and certification on Sun's x64 servers. We're looking for somebody with

• Good knowledge of x86 BIOS (e.g. ACPI, SRAT, MPS)
  
• Strong x86 internals and architecture knowledge
  
• Experience writing device drivers, especially for Linux or UNIX operating systems
  
• Strong C and ASM skills.

Bonus points if you have experience working with VMware software or other virtualization technologies (e.g. Xen), if you know something about storage. The rest of Sun is a bit stodgy, but things move very quickly in the x64 server group and you must be capable of learning new thigs quickly, putting that new knowledge to work immediately, and working with a large team of people. If you ride a bike that's a double bonus; you can join me on my Friday lunch rides.

This job is in Menlo Park, California. Working remotely is not an option for this job -- you'll spend quite a bit of time in a lab messing with wires and replacing ruined flash ROMs.

Contact me if you think you're qualified. If I like you, you're probably hired.
Photo info: In the office by richardmasoner.

Bicycle dynamics

For the engineering and physics geeks out there, here's a Wikipedia article on Bicycle and Motorcycle Dynamics that describes the science of the motion of bicycles and motorcycles. It is concerned with the motions of bikes, their parts, and the forces acting on them.

And in blog post, former bicycle framebuilder Dave Moulton explains the mechanics of steering a bicycle.

For my U.S. and Canadian readers, enjoy your three day weekend. Turn the computer off, go out and ride your bike!
Photo info: No hands! by photoblue.

Bay Area Transportation News

Many buyers have unrealistic expectations of hybrid car benefits.

Public transit riders rejoice: cleaner diesel at the pumps today!

Speaking of transit, Santa Cruz Metro is adding service for the first time in several years. I ride their Highway 17 Express from my home to San Jose, CA every day and the bus has been very crowded lately. Grab new wallet-size Highway 17 Express schedules from IRideTheBus.org.

I was in San Jose the other day when Amtrak California announced an expanded schedule with 14 daily trains to and from San Jose and 32 daily trains between Sacrameno and Oakland. Altamont Commuter Express also announced an additional round-trip train between Stockton and San Jose.