Blog for Sunday, 18th November 2007

18/11/2007: USD/EUR Exchange Rate Graph

The chart above shows the fall of the US dollar against the Euro over the last eight years, with some key events in American politics and economics noted, which may or may not be seen as causes or effects of the falling dollar.

18/11/2007: William Tell: 700 Years On

Today marks 700 years since the date traditionally regarded as the day when William Tell shot an apple off the top of his son’s head with a crossbow and kick-started a resolution against the Austrians which led to the founding of Switzerland.

The legend goes that the Austrian Hermann Gessler was appointed vogt (sheriff) of Altdorf. The power went to his head, and he had erected in the town square a wooden pole; Gessler’s hat was placed atop the pole and the townspeople were expected to salute the pole whenever they passed it. Perhaps as an act of defiance, or perhaps because no-one had told him about the new rule, Tell happened to walk through the town square without saluting. Gessler ordered him to be arrested.

Upon hearing of Tell’s reputation as an archer, Gessler decided on a very unusual punishment: for Tell to be ordered to perform a seemingly impossible task, and shoot an apple off his own son’s head from a great distance. If he refused, or failed in the task, both William Sr and William Jr would…

18/11/2007: Dhyana.pl Updated

This release works around errors in capturing screen shots from certain WMV files. It also changes the default geometry from 240×180+0+0 to “auto” which is an automatically calculated, hopefully appropriate, geometry.