A question that often arises as an objection to Open Source software is: How can I make money from software if I am giving it away for free?Let us start by a few news items first.Techworld reports that the German National Railway has successfully migrated 55,000 users to Linux. The roll out was overseen by IBM.Reuters reports that in Extremadura, Spain, 14,000 medical professionals will be given access to a system that is based on Open Source software. This is also an IBM contract for 33$ million.

In this post September 11 world we live in, terrorism is such an ill-defined, emotionally charged issue, that rarely gets discussed rationally anymore.In the early weeks after Septermber 11, the question of "Why they hate us" was systematically raised by U.S. media. As the U.S. invaded Afghanistan, this discourse all but died out, and has not been revisited since. At least not in the USA.There is a glimpse of hope elsewhere though. The International Summit of Democracy, Terrorism and Security is underway in Spain.

Regarding the Indian Ocean Tsunami of December 2004, one has to notice that the level of detail that the rest of the world had of this crisis is amazing compared to other natural disasters.One reason in my opinion is that many "normal" people own gadgets such as digital cameras and video camcorders. The people on the scene were able to take photos and footage of the disaster as it was happening.

A friend of mine, Clifford M, is from Kerala, India. On a recent trip there, he found an interesting area in a rubber plantation full of what looks like previously molten metal. If you can identify this object with certainity, then please contact me.

When snow falls, how it looks like depends on complex weather conditions. Often, we are treated to a spectacular show, when lots of it accumulate on tree branches. Such an occurance happened on February 16, 2005. Here are the pictures.

Today was one of the most dangerous day ever I have seen in Canada. Overnight, there was a lot of freezing rain. Since it was a normal school and work day, I had to go out and drop both daughters to school.I briefly explained freezing rain in another article. Freezing rain can also make for a spectacular nature show when trees are covered with shiny ice.This was not one of these days. First, the car slipped in the drive way when backing out of the garage.

Although the common stereotype of Canadian winters is that they are really cold, and really snowy, there is a lot of variation within one winter. A week or two can make a lot of a difference. This article demonstrates how winter, just two weeks apart, can be so different. It also shows that many aspects of winter can be fun too.

A few weeks back, someone on Drupal.org posted asking for help did not know how to apply the patches against the themes in order to get Jeremy's KernelTrap.org excellent banner module working.I responded to them by offering to email them the patched theme. Since then, several people asked for the same thing. Therefore, I am posting here the patched theme files for pushbutton and bluemarine themes on Drupal 4.5.0, in case anyone else asks for them.

I wrote and contributed the stock module,which provides stock quotes from a web form, as well as a portfolio feature for registered site users, where they can save their favorite stock symbols. It uses Yahoo! Finance for getting the quotes.

I wrote and contributed the feedback module, which is basically something I needed, and did not find -- at the time -- in the Drupal contributed modules list. It allows people visiting my sites to send me an email without revealing my email address, thus protecting from SPAM, and privacy.In June 2005, feedback was #15 in the top 20 downloaded Drupal projects, which includes modules and themes. In effect, it was  #8 in the top 10 modules.