This web page is horribly, horribly out of date. Read with a pinch of salt!
I'm a Director and the Company Secretary of a small pub company. Our first pub, the Coalheavers Arms in Peterborough, opened in August 2002. Our second pub, the Oakdale Arms in Harringay (London) opened in June 2003 (see "The Trouble With Harringay" for some information about the area, particularly its spelling). The third pub, The Pembury Tavern in Hackney, opened in January 2006.
I used to be a research assistant in the Security Group of the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory. Before that I was a research assistant and then a PhD student in the Systems Research Group.
I don't want to put lots of personal information on the web. I don't really like writing about myself, and as far as I know there are very few pictures of me available. I spend most of my time on these things:
That's all I can find time for at the moment; in the past I've spent large amounts of time playing the piano and 'cello, but unfortunately I can't fit them in now.
I like reading comics and graphic novels. The most recent I've read is Preacher (now finished; not really all that recent actually). Strangers in Paradise is excellent, and of course there are classics like the Sandman series, V for Vendetta and Watchmen (and most other things by Alan Moore). Online, Sluggy Freelance is funny, Girl Genius is good, and Order of the Stick is full of in-jokes. (Also try Dilbert, User Friendly, MegaTokyo, Questionable Content and Sinfest.
I play games like Die Siedler von Catan, Carcassonne and Illuminati, usually with my sister and brother-in-law (although less so since they moved to New York), and anybody else who happens to be around at the time. Cheapass games are usually quite fun, and I was recently introduced to games played with Icehouse pieces (particularly Zendo) by a friend.
I'm the administrator of the UKcrypto mailing list.
I've spent far too long writing VPN software.
This patch to VCG enables hyperlinks to be embedded in VCG output when it's turned into PDF format. I added this obscure feature at the request of Owen Dunn, who was generating interesting graphs of Java packages at the time, and wanted to include links to the package documentation in the graphs.
I used to play about with Postscript quite a lot, and at some point I'll make my Python and Perl code for munging Postscript documents available. I'm fed up with the way that so many applications produce non-DSC-compliant output (and a bit at the DSC specification for being so unclear and open to interpretation). I think I should start a "DSC hall-of-shame" listing programs that produce dodgy Postscript output (and then, if they are free software, fix them), but I don't have time at the moment. I just work around the problems when I find them.
Here's the Union Jack in Postscript. Constructed according to this diagram.
Update: I don't use Postscript so much any more. I usually write Python scripts that generate PDF files directly now, using the PDF backend to sping/piddle. CUPS can deal with PDF files directly.
I like Python. Since the "nested scopes" feature was introduced in Python 2.1 (although you have to add the line "from __future__ import nested_scopes" to enable it) Python's been a fairly sensible programming language.
I enjoy building hardware. Until I became very busy I was working on a networked MP3 player. This project is now on hold until I've finished my thesis, the G3Card project is over, and the 2002 Cambridge Beer Festival has happened. Perhaps July 2002? (Update, July 2002: no, I still don't have time. The G3Card project is in full swing, my thesis is stalled, and I'm refurbishing a pub in Peterborough. Update, November 2003: still no time, and other people have now developed equivalent devices.)
Since I started using Mozilla as my web browser I've realised just how unpleasant and faulty Netscape 4 actually was. At some point I'll probably tart up this page using some of the standards-compliant techniques described at css/edge.
I play Starcraft with friends (over the sinister greenend VPN using bnetd) rather more often than I should. Unfortunately Blizzard, the publishers, have turned out to be evil abusers of the DMCA (an ill-thought-out American law that was bought by the "content" industry) so I plan not to buy anything else from them in the future. There's a copy of bnetd available locally.
Chronic Logic games are fun; I particularly like Triptych.
I also play NetHack, although I'm not very good at it. Recently I was doing very well as a Magician - I had +4 gray dragon scale mail, speed boots, strength of 18/92 (mostly from eating tinned giants), AC of -17 (since I'd purchased protection from a priest after raiding Fort Ludios) and most of the useful intrinsics - and I suddenly choked to death on some food because I hadn't noticed I was already full. Argh! Before that, the last reasonable game I played ended up with me being turned into a green slime somewhere in Gehennom - I couldn't reverse the sliming in time. Next time I'll make sure I carry a scroll of fire where I can easily get at it - they won't get me that way again... (Update: they didn't, but I was killed by the High Priestess of Moloch while I was otherwise distracted by the Wizard of Yendor.) (Another update: I finally ascended a human male neutral wizard on 1st January 2004. At last! I've beaten it, once. I'm now working on a human male neutral priest, who is generally killed off through stupidity/tiredness/drunkenness.)
The Internet Oracle is occasionally amusing.
I have collected some information on the BT Diverse (Siemens GigaSet) range of cordless telephones. This is now rather out-of-date and does not cover recent models.
Everyone who writes Makefiles should have read Recursive Make Considered Harmful by Peter Miller.
The Sinister Greenend Organisation knows where to find me.
Mail should be sent to steve@greenend.org.uk. If you ever send mail to Stephen.Early.1006@myrddin.greenend.org.uk then further mail from you will be rejected as an anti-spam measure.
My telephone number is 07715 422132.
