3D or not 3D?

With televisions delivering every increasing levels of definition, blu-ray players producing images of clarity to rival any big screen and home theatre kits becoming more affordable all the time, not to mention the illegal availability of films online before their official release, more and more people are watching movies in their comfort of their own homes.
To counter this, cinemas have had to resort to offers like monthly tickets, premium seating, and service in your seat to encourage film buffs through their doors. In short, a trip to the cinema has to offer something that cannot be as easily obtained within your own home, otherwise the trip is seen by many as unnecessary.
One of the more recent innovations that the studios have re-introduced is the concept of 3D. Tried and failed regularly throughout the last 50 years, technology has evolved from red and blue shaded glasses to polarised lenses giving a sense of true depth to the screen, as well as allowing objects to appear to be approaching you from the flat panel.
The drawback with this new gimmick (and that is all it is, a gimmick) is that it should be used as part of the story, not dicatating how the story itself evolves. The film should be developed enough to be told equally well in 3D as in traditional 2D, with the extra dimension only adding to the experience, not dicatating the storyline.
Following the success of Toy Story, and subsequent Pixar masterpieces, studios were tripping over themselves to release their own CG movies. The majority of these releases failed to realise that the true genius of Toy Story was the story itself, it could have as easily been told in live action, animated or with sock puppets and it would have been the same excellent story. Pixar and Disney Animation Chief Creative Officer John Lassiter has gone as far to state that CG is not a genre, it's another format for telling a story.
We can only hope that directors treat 3D as well as Pixar have treated CG.

To abort an ant build if a property is not set

The easiest way to abort an Ant - http://ant.apache.org/ - build if a user-defined property (e.g. password, filename, etc) is not set is to use the task with a condition element as follows

<fail message="@{propertyName} is not set">
<condition>
<not>
<isset property="@{propertyValue}" />
</not>
</condition>
</fail>

To test a range of properties, use this code snippet to create a macro:

<macrodef name="testProperty">
<attribute name="propertyName" />
<attribute name="propertyValue" />
<sequential>
<fail message="@{propertyName} is not set">
<condition>
<not>
<isset property="@{propertyValue}" />
</not>
</condition>
</fail>
</sequential>
</macrodef>

then simply call this macro with each value you want to test
<testProperty propertyName="property1" propertyValue="${property1}" />
<testProperty propertyName="property2" propertyValue="${property2}" />
<testProperty propertyName="property3" propertyValue="${property3}" />
<testProperty propertyName="property4" propertyValue="${property4}" />
<testProperty propertyName="property5" propertyValue="${property5}" />

2009 - A Year In Fitness

A record of the exercise I took in 2009
I finished the year on 94kg, losing 3kg over the year, but almost 2 inches off my waist. I'd hope to continue in this vein in 2010 and be below 88kg by the end of the year.

	Gym	Swimming	Football	Tag Rugby	Total	Weight
January	11	4	3	0	18	97
February	10	6	2	0	18	97
March	8	6	2	0	16	95
April	8	6	4	0	18	97
May	8	6	4	0	18	97
June	7	6	4	2	19	96.8
July	6	7	4	4	21	95
August	5	6	5	6	22	94
September	5	6	3	3	17	95
October	2	2	2	0	6
November	5	3	4	0	12	95
December	2	5	2	0	9	94
	77	63	39	15	194

Things that were true about me one year ago that are no longer true

I had never met a Karen I didn't like
I had never been to France, so I had never seen the Eiffel Tower or the Arc de Triomphe
I had never been an active participant in a wedding
I had a 36 inch waist
I had not played rugby since secondary school
I had never rented the same room for more than two years
I had never had an article published
I had never been to an Ireland away game
I had never been to a semi final and seen my team lose
I had never been to an Ireland - England game
I was using a Nokia 8800
I had never designed a pair of sneakers
I had never had my photo taken with a DJ
I was in my twenties
I never had birthday cake at my desk
I had never seen an original film in 3D (although I had seen one remade in 3D)
I had never met Vince Vaughn
I had never gone on a date with more than two women in the same year
I had never developed a web application in Java (although I had developed one in XQuery)
I had never been on the Eurostar
I had never seen a film before it had been completed
I had no Italian friends on facebook
I was not following any celebrities on twitter
I had never accessed twitter anyway except through the web interface
I had never seen the Kaiser Chiefs live
I had not done any charity work in over 2 years
I did not have a Google Wave account
I had never seen St Patrick's Athletic play live
I had never heard of Pawnee, Indiana or Veridian Dynamics
I had only seen rugby played at Thomond Park
I had never been to the National Concert Hall
I had never had my photo taken with the batmobile
I had never been to an AIL final