France

Enduro racing could be a long-term mountain bike craze, or a here today, gone tomorrow discipline. Photo: Allen Krughoff | HardcastlePhotography.comIn case you’ve been off the grid at a sweat lodge on the Mexican border, enduro mountain bike racing has arrived. On one hand, the excitement is palpable. On the other, it rings of the sport’s faded glory days, when NORBA cross-country could be found on national TV, or those few years that thousands flocked to rural backwaters for 24-hour races. If road and mountain biking are siblings, the former is an even-keeled professional with a suburban home, maybe kids. Mountain biking, however, has bounced around between an unfinished Ph.D., a sojourn in South America, multiple minor arrests, and annual trips to Burning Man. While road relishes consistent events and formats borne out of years of tradition, mountain biking frequently reinvents itself, usually based on the most current racing trend. What is enduro? Enduro is that latest trend. But perhaps, this time, it can enrich the sport in the long-term. For the benefit of the sweat lodge set, enduro is a race on a long (10- to 30-minute), technical, undulating downhill. Usually, multiple stages are combined to determine overall standings. As with most mountain bike races, the format and courses vary based on the venue and whim of the organizers. In its purest form, enduro is a grassroots, accessible way for average mountain bikers to race. Neither eight-inch travel bikes nor endless base miles are necessary to hop in and have a fun time. The trail bikes people already own are well suited to the courses. If mountain biking wants to settle down a little, a steady influx of grassroots participation will go a long way, but there are pitfalls looming: To the race organizers: Many race series have been doomed by inattention to the racers’ needs — your customers. Do you think they are going to gush about how much they love corporate sponsorship over post-race beers? Race promotion should be less like selling tickets to a Miley Cyrus concert and more like putting together an elaborate pig roast for your 200 closest friends. To the bike companies: Don’t make enduro-specific products. Make mountain bike gear that works well for hard-charging riders that pedal. You shouldn’t need specialized gear to hop in a race. The average mountain bike will do just fine. Thanks to many companies, these bikes are better than ever, but don’t let fashion drive product development into the hinterlands of specificity. If I see an enduro skinsuit next year, I will dropkick my POC helmet with the rage of an ejected NCAA basketball coach. To the riders: Don’t believe the hype. This isn’t new. Enduro is just a race format. Enduro “riding” or “training”? That’s what we call “mountain biking,” my friend, and we’ve been doing it for years. Keep it fun, get new riders involved, and don’t take it too seriously. Honestly, the fellas riding Repack back in the ’70s were living the enduro lifestyle harder than the majority of people buying dropper posts today, so keep it in perspective. Power to the people Like any half-crazy, free spirited sibling, mountain biking always manages to inspire. Does it need to find a career path? Does it need a racing format with staying power? Maybe. People race regardless, so why not cultivate enduro, which is coherent with the average rider’s experience; ride up to ride down. Give them great events and versatile technology. Yes, it’s fun to marvel at Olympic XC racing or downhill forks that rival moto componentry, but how far can that inspiration take us? Mountain biking isn’t likely to find its own Tour de France to attract millions of spectators. Don’t force it to wear that monkey suit. Embrace the grassroots. Go try an enduro race, and maybe you’ll see what I mean. Editor’s note: The Dirt Dispatch is an opinion column periodically penned by VeloNews tech writer Spencer Powlison. He draws on his New England-born pragmatism and over 18 ye

For those who haven’t been paying attention over last few months, renown French suspension manufacturer – BOS, has...

Jane the Fox and Me By Fanny Britt Illustrated by Isabelle Arsenault Translated by Christelle Morelli and Susan Ouriou Groundwood Books ISBN: 978-1-55498-360-5 $19.95 Ages 9-12 On shelves September 1st Isn’t it strange how few children’s graphic novels are published in a given year? This is one of those phenomena that defy the basic tenants of capitalism. The need, as anyone who has ever fielded reference questions from 10-year-olds will attest, is vast. Yet the product sputters out of publishing houses so sparsely and randomly that you can’t help but be baffled. The only justification I can come up with is that graphic novels are bloody expensive to produce. That would certainly account for how many settle for single colors or black and white. Then there’s the fact that they take forever to create. Even if a kid adores the first book in a series, if the art is really well done it could easily take an artist seven years to produce a sequel. Seven years is a long time if you’re ten. Taking all of this into account, I am understandably wary when a new GN hits bookstore and library shelves and I feel my pulse pick up. Am I excited about this book because it is good or because it’s a rarity? With Jane, the Fox & Me by Fanny Britt the answer is clear. I am excited about this book because this book is exciting. In the awe-inspiring sense, of course. So many kids in school wish they weren’t considered invisible. For Helene, the opposite is true. Everywhere she goes she runs into cruel comments about her weight or that she smells or equally childish accusations. Most of these are from the girls she used to hang out with, before they decided to suddenly make her into a pariah. Her only escape is a copy of Jane Eyre which she dives into at every available moment. When her class wins a special “treat” of going to a nature camp for four nights nothing could be more unwelcome. At the camp Helene finds herself in the outcast cabin, and even the sight of a wild fox can’t break her out of her depression. It isn’t until she meets Geraldine and finds herself in the thick of a new, true friendship that things start to subtly take a turn for the better. Originally published in Quebec as Jane, le Renard & Moi, reading the book is a clear trip into another culture. For the United States-born child reader, some of the elements in the story may strike them as unusual. The fact that the student Lucia Munix “can’t speak French yet because she just moved to Montreal” will be a tip-off, or else the names of the characters (Geraldine, Gerard, Marthe, Genevieve, etc.). My suspicion, however, is that the bulk of U.S. readers aren’t even going to notice. At its heart, this is a universal story. You relate to the bullying, the ability to identify with a fictional character (even as we identify with Helene), and the school setting. I certainly identified with those moments when Helene will pretend to tie her shoe or do something similarly minor to look busy. They’re small moments, but remarkably real. With its original French roots I have to give translators Christelle Morelli and Susan Ouriou full credit for a remarkable job. Not enough people in this world understand how crucial the writing is in any given graphic novel. It’s what separates the wheat from the chaff. And because this is a quiet school story, so much of the book depends on Helene’s singular voice and observations. There’s a section near the beginning of the book when Helene recounts a day when she woke up to find that her mother had sewed a crinoline dress for her in the night. Looking at it she can’t help but list everything her mother does for the family, from the laundry to meals to the sewing. She imagines her mother so exhausted at the end of the day, yet still working on this dress, that she says, “to herself out loud so just maybe someone will hear her, even though by now everyone’s in bed, ‘I’m so tired I could die’.” Thinking of all this she continues to stare in the mirror. H

A flashback to what I was reviewing in June 2008: Day of the Scarab by Catherine Fisher. Sequel to The Sphere of Secrets. From my review: “A world with gods, where those in control stopped believing. But it turns out the gods and the myths are real; and a handful of people, including a young priestess, a scribe, and a thief, are chosen by the god to fix things. . . . It’s a bit weird writing up something for a third book; on the one hand, if you’ve read the other 2, you are breathless and eager to read this one. On the other hand, if you haven’t, what I want to say is this: Here is a brilliantly plotted fantasy, tightly told, over three volumes. It is worth your investment to go, read the first, and continue thru all three. This final book has a wonderful conclusion; it addresses the main issues raised in the trilogy (restoration of the Oracle, threats of rebellion, the preservation of religions) yet does not answer every question.” Whales on Stilts by M.T. Anderson. Series: M.T. Anderson’s Thrilling Tales. From my review: “The Thrilling Tale of Katie Mulligan (you remember her from the Horror Hollow Books), Jasper Dash (Boy Technonaut) and Lily Gefelty as they encounter Whales — on — Stilts. (I’m saying that in my Pigs In Space voice.) . . . To begin with: “On Career Day Lily visited her dad’s work with him and discovered he worked for a mad scientist who wanted to rule the earth through destruction and desolation.” Could there be a better opening line? Or summation of a plot? Lily herself is quietly observant: “Lily believed that the world was a wonderful and magical place. She believed that if watched carefully enough, you could find miracles anywhere.” . . . But, as I said, you don’t need to know that Katie is RL Stine come to life or Jasper a throwback to the 20s/30s to enjoy the humor. Dad works in an abandoned warehouse on edge of town. With a receptionist. That, my friends, is the type of humor I adore. An abandoned warehouse where the father doesn’t realize something is up, is just plain crazy; add in a receptionist for the evil people? And chums, it is brilliant.” King Of Shadows by Susan Cooper. From my review: “Present-day Nat is a teenager and actor who is in a staging of one of Shakespeare’s Plays. Then, boom! Time slip happens and he’s back in the day, meeting the real Bard.” Gray Horses by Hope Larson. From my review: “This graphic novel looks at the experiences of a French exchange student in America; the art and text is deceptively simple. Noemie struggles with loneliness, fitting in, finding friends; and is also having odd dreams about horses.”

The French version is available on linuxembedded.fr : Crée un CD d’installation d’une debian spécialisée The goal is to build a debian install CD suitable for the distribution of a complete system including the operating system and applications. Debian already has a tool for that purpose: simple-cdd. Simple-cdd is a set of scripts wrapping debian-cd which is the tool used to build official CDs. In our case, we will include some “non-free” packages (firmwares for instance) and application specific packages in the system. Using simple-cdd Simple-cdd gets some of its configuration from your host computer, so it’s recommended to work on a machine similar to your target (in particular the machine should use the same architecture: i386 or amd64). All the following actions should be done in a working directory that will contain the downloads and configurations for our system. We will start by creting a configuration file “my-cdd.conf” stating the mirror and components to use: debian_mirror="http://ftp2.fr.debian.org/debian/" mirror_components="main contrib non-free" Then we will launch the build-simple-cdd tool once. This will build a local mirror of the needed packages that we will reused later. So be patient this can be a bit long. build-simple-cdd --conf ./my-cdd.conf Once done, you should get a CD iso in the “images” subfolder. Customizing the image To customize our image we will create a profile “my-profile” that will define which package to install and which extra package to include on the CD (dev packages for instance). Create a “profiles” folder: mkdir profiles Selecting the packages If you’ve got an already installed machine (the one you used to test your application) you can ask dpkg to list the installed packages from that machine and use that as a basis. dpkg --get-selections >package-list In this file only the names of packages in  the “install” state are needed: grep -e '\profiles/my-profile.downloads The file “my-profile.downloads” is a list of packages to include on the CD-ROM. The list of program to install is “my-profile.packages”. The tool will resolve dependencies, so we don’t need to track down all dependencies add add them to these files. Specific packages We want to add some custom packages that we built ourselves to the CD, those packages not present in the debian archive. Let’s create a “local_pkg” folder and fill it with all of our packages. We now can update the configuration to use all those files and make the profile “my-profile” the default profile. debian_mirror="http://ftp2.fr.debian.org/debian/" mirror_components="main contrib non-free" simple_cdd_dir=$(pwd) profiles="my-profile" auto_profiles="my-profile" local_packages="$simple_cdd_dir/local_pkg/" If you now run the tool again, you’ll get a full custom install CD! build-simple-cdd --conf ./my-cdd.conf However you might have missed some specific packages or their dependencies, in that case they will be missing on the CD. To find this out, check the messages for a line like: WARNING: missing optional packages from profile my-profile: libevent-2.0-5 [...] In that case libevent from squeeze-backports was missing. Simple-cdd is not able to download packages from backports, so I just added the packages to “local_pkg”. Customizing the installer Simple-cdd automatically uses a “default” profile. This profile might not suite your needs. To override it you just have to place modified file in the “profiles” folder. To do so, first copy the desired file from “/usr/share/simple-cdd/profiles/” and update it. For instance the “default.pressed” file: cp /usr/share/simple-cdd/profiles/default.pressed profiles Then update the wanted options in this file. For example the partitioning options. Also as we enabled “contrib” and “non-free” you should uncomment the following lines: d-i apt-setup/non-free  boolean true d-i apt-setup/contrib boolean true Adding extra files to the CD Finally we want to add the documentation, sources and other files to the CD. Simple-c

Hotel: Banyan Tree Acapulco, Mexico. I guess you can fully understand why my jaw dropped the moment I walked into my hotel room last weekend. Despite the fact that it was completely hectic with all the filming and we spent most of our time at the studio, waking up in this villa made me want to pinch myself every 5 minutes. 3 days were definitely too short but I am so grateful for every single second spent at that hotel, every split second.

Bike races come in a rich variety of flavours—the Big Kahuna of stage races is the Tour de France, but the Cool Kids go for the Giro d’Italia; there is the Race to the Sun and the Race of the Falling Leaves; races that began at the dawn of competition like Liege-Bastogne-Liege and races that have popped over night—Qinghai, anyone? And some, year after year, never fail to surprise or to enchant, and where a victory earns cycling immortality. Of the Classics who cannot love de Ronde van Vlaanderen, the glorious Tour of Flanders? And what makes it great is that you have to ride uphill over big rocks to win. This is crazy and you know you want to try it. “Hellingen: A Road Cyclist’s Guide to Belgium’s Greatest Climbs” is the magic lamp to rub to make that wish come true. Simon Warren, author of a guide to British hills entitled “100 Greatest Cycling Climbs” and its companion volume “Another 100 Greatest Cycling Climbs,” has widened his horizons, crossed the Channel and taken on the famous climbs of cycling-mad Belgium. There are only 50 climbs in this pocket-sized volume but they include many of the most famous climbs in Flanders and Wallonia. The book opens with his account of luring his family to Belgium in August with the promise of tourism, steak and frites and, obviously, beer. He writes of how cycling is so woven into the fabric of life in Belgium and one of the great joys of the sport: even if you could buy a Formula 1 car you would have no place to drive whereas we can get on our bicycles and ride up the same brutal, painful, tortured climbs as the pros do. The first thing to do is to figure out how to ride the cobbles as most of us don’t have much of an opportunity. The author has a nice page devoted to technique, which seems counter-intuitive as you have to relax while being pounded by the pavé and trying to be smooth while slamming into the rough surfaces or avoiding gaps. Reducing tire pressure helps and running wider tires too. It is also a good idea to make sure all the fasteners on your bike are tightened before doing this. By the way, the author says that “cobbles” are only naturally occurring stones whereas cut and finished ones are called “setts.” Not that this matters since they generally appear to be dreadfully finished and put in place by drunks. Reflecting Belgium’s dual nature (Flanders/Wallonia; Flemish/French) the book is divided into two sections covering the climbs in question. The “Hellingen” as the climbs are known in Flemish are short and steep and often cobbled in Flanders while in Wallonia they tend to be longer, almost as steep and generally paved with tarmac of varying quality. Each section covers two pages, with a picture of the road surface on the left and text about the ride, how to get to it and of course a rating out of 10. Apparently “1” is considered “hard,” while “10” is “almost impossible.” So in Flanders our 25 climbs include a fair number of legends, like the Kemmelberg, Oude Kwaremont, the Paterberg, the Koppenberg (9/10) and the Muur-Kapelmuur in Geraardsbergen (10/10). After you have chosen likely candidates there is a chapter that allows you to pick the climb through its road surface, much like a connoisseur’s guide to wine. Swirl around the idea of the Koppenberg: “Anarchy beneath your tyres. Slippy, steep and utterly random.” Or the Molenberg would be more to your taste? “Stones? They are more like asteroids floating in space. It’s like trying to ride over Stonehenge.” The Ardennes climbs in Wallonia are spread over a much larger area of the country but are to be found to the southeast and southwest of Liège. The winner in this group is clearly the Mur de Huy of Flèche Wallonne fame: 19% maximum gradient earns it a 10/10. Oddly enough, I found it much harder than the Col de Haussire, “the toughest climb in Belgium,” near La-Roche-en-Ardenne. 3.9 kms long, it hits 20% near the top and also earns the 10/10, where

Taking cues from Tencent’s messaging app WeChat, Hike has added Push-to-talk (PTT) and other features to its instant messaging app (hat tip Anupam Saxena). The feature is currently available on Hike’s iOS, Android and Windows Phone 8 apps. It’s not clear whether the company has also rolled it out to its Windows Phone 7, BlackBerry and Symbian apps. Besides PTT feature, it has also added support for  four new languages including Spanish, French, Russian, and Portuguese, ability to share last seen only to your circle of friends, and added two new free sticker packs – Snuggles the Dog and Miley the Cat. When we checked on our Android handset, the PTT feature is insanely easier to use, however, what irks me is to send an voice message I have to go through two clicks. Comparatively, WeChat handles it much better with just one click to send voice message. However, WeChat is pushing its PTT feature more than text messaging and it takes more number of clicks to send a text message in WeChat than in other instant messaging apps. Check out the layout of Hike on the left and WeChat on the right.   It has also added a new feature to share when a user was last online only with Circle of Friends. However, we feel the feature is counterintuitive, as this feature is actually used by close friends to question why you aren’t replying. Besides this, Hike has also added support for Spanish, French, Russian, and Portuguese. Note that Hike already supports German. However, we found it rather difficult to enable new language on Android handset. Hike team informs us that it can be done from Android settings, however it didn’t appear for us in Android settings. In April 2013, Hike had announced that it had crossed 5 million users since its global launch in December 2012. Hike had also informed MediaNama that 60% of its user base is from India and the rest global led by Middle East and Europe. Around 20 percent of its overall messaging traffic comes from its Hike2sms feature. In the same month, Hike had also raised $7 million in funding from Bharti SoftBank and had revamped its mobile apps bringing in new features like status update with moods, circle of friends and mute notifications among others.

I almost did a spit-take on reading that the organization that oversees the 1855 Bordeaux classification is applying for UNESCO World Heritage status.  UNESCO is the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, which is sort of the U.N.’s kumbaya wing; and part of it is the World Heritage Centre, which recognizes world sites of great historical and cultural importance and seeks to protect and preserve them. Among the 962 recognized World Heritage sites are Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, the historic center of Vienna, the Magao caves of China, the Acropolis, Israel’s Masada, the Pyramids of Egypt and, here in the States, Mammoth Cave, Yellowstone and the Statue of Liberty. And now–let me get this straight–the Bordelais want to include a list of wineries? What am I failing to understand here? The Classification was drawn up, let us remember, by wine brokers, who had been asked by the Emperor Napoleon to choose wines to display at a Paris exposition. It was nothing more nor less than a price list. True, it has assumed far more importance over the decades, but it’s hard to see how a “classification” can be included on a list of World Heritage sites. I suppose I might have more sympathy with the nomination if they had suggested Bordeaux itself as a region, rather than the 1855 Classification. But then, Bordeaux already received World Heritage status (in 2007), so what is it that the nominators are looking for, beyond that? All we have to go by is the Decanter story; I could find no additional information on the Internet. Here’s how the magazine quoted Phillippe Castéja, president of the Conseil des Grands Crus Classés, in explaining his group’s nomination: The 1855 classification is the fruit of both natural and human factors and it has only gained in importance over time. Its value lies not just in the excellence of the wines, but the architectural richness its chateaux have brought to Bordeaux, the artisanal trades that it supports, from hand-picking of grapes to traditional vine pruning skills, to the renown that it has bought to France across the world. This is true, as far as it goes, but Bordeaux’s architectural heritage already was honored in that 2007 World Heritage status, and it’s not clear to me (from an admittedly inadequate but nonetheless fairly closely scrutinized review of the existing list) that there are any other World Heritage sites that are devoted to “trades” and “skills,” as opposed to places. Nor is it clear from the Operational Guidelines whether such recognition is even possible. It may be that the Bordelais are seeking recognition, not as a “natural heritage” (such as Mammoth Cave) but as a “cultural landscape,” which is allowed. The Guidelines define “cultural landscape” as, briefly, “the combined works of nature and man,” and as “illustrative of the evolution of human society and settlement over time.” But it’s very hard to see how the 1855 Classification would qualify as a “cultural landscape” the way, say, the Honghe Hani Rice Terraces of China (which is currently nominated for Heritage status) are. It looks to me like the Bordelais, having achieved their World Heritage status six years ago, are looking to gild the lily. Maybe I’m wrong. But if the 1855 Classification is worthy of World Heritage status, then so are the U.S. Constitution and Declaration of Independence. I therefore officially nominate our founding documents.

Meyer an option for high mountains, says White