The problem: The later versions of inkscape use cairo to generate eps files. The new version of cairo doesn’t have explicit strings for the words in the eps files. Instead of having the string “(hello)Tj” somewhere in your eps file, you have the string “<0102030304>Tj”. Psfrag looks for hello somewhere, can’t find it and hence is utterly confused. As a result, so are you. (Un)fortunately, inkscape is a really good FOSS program and I’m unwilling to change my ways at this point.

The solution: Here’s my workflow.

1. Make a file in inkscape as usual. Use short labels (which will later be replaced by psfrag) if you want to make it quicker later on. I just go through the alphabet in sequence.
2. Replace all the <##>Tj strings with (CC)Tj. Make sure to change the numbers to the right letters. (If you write the letters in order in inkscape, then 01 corresponds to a, 02 corresponds to b, etc.) To be a bit quicker, I make a epsfix.sh script, which does it for me once I’ve figured it out. This way, I can modify the figure later on and not go completely mad. A sample script is shown at the bottom for 2 labels, a and b.
3. run epsfix.sh
4. produce dvi using kile (I use kile, you might not)
5. produce ps from dvi using kile (or whatever it is you use)
6. ps2pdf text.ps text.pdf (because using kile and dvi2pdf(?), the pdf doesn’t have the psfrag substitutions in)

As an extra (which I always forget also): to get text on multiple lines using psfrag, use a shortstack: “\psfrag{label}{\shortstack[l]{some more\\text}}”.

Not simple and not pretty. There are probably more succint and elegant scripts for epsfix.sh. You might be able to get the pdf generation to work from withing kile. Personally, I’ve given up and just keep a terminal window open for that operation.

Sample script epsfix.sh with 2 labels, a and b:

#! /bin/sh
cp fig.eps fig.eps.backup ##(for your sanity the first time you run the script)
mv temp.eps fig.eps
sed ‘s/<01>/(a)/’ fig.eps | sed ‘s/<02>/(b)/’ > temp.eps
rm fig.eps
mv temp.eps fig.eps

I haven’t been contacted by a head hunter yet…

Why is that?

• They might not be looking for people like me that hard. I can’t do anything about that.
• They might need more time to look/find me. I can’t do anything about that either.
• I might not exist in their wold. Now there’s a problem.

My friend was contacted on LinkedIn, which I guess by now is a de facto standard for translating online your professional identity. I didn’t have a linkedin account until this morning. In fact, unless you’re absolutely intent on finding who I am as a researcher and a scientist using online search tools, you have to really know what you’re looking for. You need to know I work on detonation waves and solid explosives mostly. In fact, if you go on google and look for my online professional self, you don’t find him. You quickly learn I like photography (and you get to see some of the pictures I’ve taken over the years), you find this blog (which is neither very well maintained nor very  professional) and you discover that I commented on a Richard Martineau’s cyberpresse blog years ago and I was once too drunk. I don’t regret what I wrote, but it’s hardly a good description of my professional life.

Hence the title of this post and my need to create a new (additional?) online persona. The professional me: Charles-the-scientist-online.

There’s not a standard site scientists and researcher types should go to in order to define that online persona. There’s not yet a clear standard for an online-facebook-scientist-social-network. Here are thus the first 2 steps I’ve picked:

1. At-least-weekly updates to this blog (which ultimately will be beneficial for me in several other ways);
2. Create a proper account on linkedin.

Why those first two steps?

1. My facebook account is rather non-professional and I’ve kept it rather hidden. When you look for me online, my facebook account doesn’t come up very high (as of 11/06/2010, it doesn’t show up on the first page of google results for my name). I’d like to keep it that way. This website, on the other hand, has been coming up in first place for a while. I may as well capitalize on this.
2. As I hinted earlier, linkedin seems to be a de facto standard now. I’m guessing I can use that site as a repository of CV, links to stuff I’ve created, etc.

So far, I’ve successfully created an account on linkedin and I already had a question. I had to pick between the basic (free) account and the premium experience (25$/month) account. As I’m not really looking for a job just now, I decided to go with the free option. I wasn’t quite sure at first what the best option was to be found. Then again, I imagine most people are probably on the free account anyway (they claim to have 80 million users, which if everyone was on the paid option would mean 1.6 billion dollars monthly revenue…)

More news on the creation of the new online persona as time goes by, although an interesting question has already popped up in my head. Is there room on the internet for two of me? My personal facebook profile is pretty much limited to facebook. What if I wanted that information to be public, would I have a problem? Would the personal friend-me be competing with the professional-scientist-me for online exposure? How do you manage that situation?

I thought about the topic of this particular post while I was waiting for my carry-on at the “security” check point. The guy operating the x-ray machine looked perplexed while looking at the pink and purple picture of my bag. Just for kicks, I thought I’d make the list of the items that I’ve tested and can make it through the Albuquerque check point:

• a 2.5″ diameter cardboard tube (it has pictures rolled inside there, christmas present for my parents and in-laws who, hopefully, don’t read my blog yet)
• a camera tripod (with the head unscrewed so it can fit in the carry-on. I guess that makes it just a really big metal stick.)
• frozen green chili (wrapped up in plastic, then in paper and then in plastic again. To be fair, it is Albuquerque, so they may be very familiar with what green chili looks like under x-ray.)
• a bunch of electronic things (ipod, fm transmitter, headphones) with all the cords mangled together.

and finally, the one which really surprises me

• two home made fruit cakes (made by my wife I should mention so nobody thinks I can actually cook). This is my mom’s recipe which is as dense as steel and each cake is wrapped in gauze (and drenched in brandy, hmmmmmm), then wrapped in plastic foil and then wrapped in tin foil. I can’t believe that looks like anything intelligible on an x-ray.

Thank god for airport security keeping me and my holiday festivities safe!