Blackmoor Vituperative

The Florida Senate passed an eminent domain reform bill Thursday that would limit the powers of local government entities.

The Senate voted 37-3 in favor of HB 1567, a version of which was passed last month by the House.

The bill prevents local governments from condemning private property and turning it over to a third-party private entity, except under certain circumstances.

“This legislation essentially eliminates the government’s ability to invoke eminent domain for economic development purposes or to increase the tax base,” said Allen Douglas, state director of National Federation of Independent Business/Florida. “The taking of public property to abate or eliminate a public nuisance, or slum or blight conditions, has been effectively banned.”

(from The South Florida Business Journal, Fla. Senate OKs eminent domain reform bill)

Wi-Fi software stack specialist Devicescape has released its “Advanced Datapath” 802.11 driver stack to the open-source community under the GPL.

One of the web sites I administer is PBEM News, a site devoted to play-by-email role-playing games. It has accouncements, a forum for questions and answers, a secure dice roller, and of course it is all free and without any advertising. If you are into that sort of thing, check it out.

Just because Microsoft refuses to support ODF (Open Document Format) never meant that someone wouldn’t write a plug-in to enable Microsoft Office users to read and write ODF documents. Well, it’s happened.

In an interview with Groklaw‘s Pamela Jones, the OpenDocument Foundation Inc.‘s co-founder and president, Gary Edwards, said the Foundation will be presenting Massachusetts with an Office plug-in that will allow Office users to open, render, and save to ODF files, while also allowing translation of documents between Microsoft’s binary (.doc, .xls, .ppt) or XML formats and ODF.

In the interview, Edwards said that the Foundation has “completed testing on an ODF Plugin for all versions of MS Office dating back to MS Office 97. The ODF Plugin installs on the file menu as a natural and transparent part of the open, save, and save as sequences. As far as end users and other application add-ons are concerned, ODF plugin renders ODF documents as if it were native to MS Office.”

Edwards hopes that this plugin, which also supports accessibility add-ons, will end any further debate about whether ODF is suitable for government use. Microsoft has continued to take pot-shots at ODF as being unsuitable for business or government users.

(from Linux-Watch, Coming soon: ODF for MS Office)

Frankly, I’d be just as happy if MS Office simply died, but I guess this is good for people who work in institutions which stupidly refuse to switch to OpenOffice.

I added a couple of new software entries to Useful Links:

I want a freeware utility to… and Open Source Freeware.

What’s New in Firefox 1.5.0.3

Firefox 1.5.0.3 is a security update that is part of our ongoing program to provide a safe Internet experience for our customers. We recommend that all users upgrade to this latest version.

(from Mozilla Firefox 1.5.0.3 Release Notes)

Clue for the clueless: if you are using any other web browser, switch to Firefox. If they use any other web browser where you work, tell them they ought to switch to Firefox. If anyone you care about uses any other web browser, be a friend and strongly suggest that they switch to Firefox.

Seriously, switch to Firefox.

Today was my first day at Circuit City, where I’m a programmer/analyst. This is the second-highest paying job I have ever had, but the highest was a short-term gig, so this is really the highest paying relatively permanent job I have ever had. It’s also the first time in roughly eight years that I have been an employee of the company where I am working. I had been doing the contracting thing for a long time. There are benefits to contracting work, but I am really glad to have a regular job again, somewhere I can (hopefully) work for years and year and feel like I am actually invested in how the company does.

And here’s a real first: no time card, no time sheets, nothing like that of any kind. This is the first time ever that I do not have to report my arrivals and departures, or at least my billable hours, to someone. As long as I meet my deliverables and attend the meetings I am supposed to attend, no one is looking over my shoulder to make sure I am warming a chair at exactly 08:30 and 16:30. Now that’s cool.

Today went really well. If it’s within my power, it will stay going really well for the next 25 years or so. 🙂