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Welcome to my blog, which was once a mailing list of the same name and is still generated by mail. Please reply via the "comment" links.

Always interested in offers/projects/new ideas. Eclectic experience in fields like: numerical computing; Python web; Java enterprise; functional languages; GPGPU; SQL databases; etc. Based in Santiago, Chile; telecommute worldwide. CV; email.

Personal Projects

Lepl parser for Python.

Colorless Green.

Photography around Santiago.

SVG experiment.

Professional Portfolio

Calibration of seismometers.

Data access via web services.

Cache rewrite.

Extending OpenSSH.

Last 100 entries

NYT Has More Details; Obvious Question; Advertising Low Cost Routes?; Similar Analysis Here; My Current Take On Surveillance Scandal; Last.fm is Hiring; How I Am 2; The back-wards compatibility fallacy; Wiggle The Mouse To Pass The Test; Python Enums on Crack, Part II; Multiple Monitors with Linux; What Is Happening In Turkey; A Simpler Enum; John Fogerty on IAmA; And You May Well Ask...; Progress on a Better Enum; I'm a MACHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINE; Those little tab things on the side of jet engines; Re: Python's sad, unimaginative Enum; Some explanation; Printing binary trees sideways; About "Python's sad, unimaginative Enum"; Atoms in python; Some good feedback here; Frustration Understood; I agree with you #nt; What would be imaginative?; Re: Enum; this is fucking useless; Enum; Python's sad, unimaginative Enum; Possible Fix; Work, Exhaustion, Vacation; VirtualBox with Centos 6.3 to 6.4, client; Matasano - Programming Lessons Learned; PDF to HTML; Alternate Substitution; Why RSA Works; Trigger; Dreaming of Death; Example: Tracing; Using Coroutines In Protocol Simulations; Python 3.3 Only; Pure Python SHA1 and MD4 Implementations; Ubuntu on VirtualBox; Starting TOR as a service on OpenSuse 12.3; 1001 Albums; Using fail2ban on OpenSuse 12.3; PPPoE on OpenSuse 12.3; Good Article on Unified Physics; It's Police (Carabineros); Linux Software for Listening to and Exploring Music; Android is Pretty Bad; Lucky Number; 3D Printing for Casting; Cover Art for MPDroid; Who'd a thought the French were so bigoted?; PS Input Signal; Small Problem with Roksan K2 Amp; Roksan K2 Amp + ATC SCM7 Speakers; Do What Makes Sense; Re: Arguing About Tests, Still; Arguing About Tests, Still; Images; Good Article on NY Drummers; Related Bug Report; Getting Python 3.3 and Virtualenv Working in OpenSuse 12.3; How I Am; Awesome video about digital audio; The Difference Between Dimensional and Normalized Databases; The rise of the new Chinese bogeyman; Updated Syntax; Very First Steps to C-ORM; The Ideal User Interface For Music Exploration; Can The Republicans Be Saved?; Rate Limiting Calls to EchoNest; Mods to Cache; Comparing UYKFG and UYKFD/E/F; Someone Else is Concerned; EchoNest-based Playlist Generator for MPD; Example Voting Results; A Heavyweight Python Cache; Identifying Artists with EchoNest; Notes on Pregalex / Pregabalina / Lyrica; The Neil Cowley Trio; Drake - Make for Data; A Reliable Python Web Service; Useful Python Date/Time Library?; Need to Sleep, But this is Good; Command Line Set Difference; Little Details...; Linux Command Line Tricks; AutoTools Tutorial; Hangman Tactics; A Tor Proxy Embedded In A Web Page; Tree (Nested Dicts) in Python; Sleeping at Parties; I Know Someone Who Hurts Other People; Light and Tea; Description of the LCS35 Time Capsule Crypto-Puzzle; Re: I can relate to that ...

© 2006-2013 Andrew Cooke (site) / post authors (content).

I Just Paid Taxes!

From: "andrew cooke" <andrew@...>

Date: Thu, 10 May 2007 21:25:12 -0400 (CLT)

I just paid my income tax for last month!  This is a major achievement -
I'm being paid in dollars by an American company, but am an English person
with permanent residency in Chile.  I think it went OK.  The process is:

- Mulesource cable me dollars
- Dollars arrive in the bank's account
- No-one tells me anything
- Eventually I go to the bank and ask
- The bank agrees that they have my money
- The bank transfers my money into a dollar fund under my name
  (this is the date on which I receive the payment, I believe)
- I record the payment in a little book of printed slips that I have
  (in duplicate) along with the day's dollar/peso conversion rate
- At some later I point I argue and plead and eventually get to transfer
  money from the dollar fund to my current account, in pesos, for a fee.
- Before 12 days after the start of the month after the month in which I
  receive the money(!) I go to http://www.sii.cl
- There I fill in form F29 as shown in the video at
  http://www.sii.cl/demos_autoasistencia/iva_f29/f29_sinmov_sin_atraso.htm
  giving the amount in pesos.
- That form calculates my tax (10%) and forwards me to my bank's web page
- At my bank's web page, I confirm payment.
- Next May I will enter my total earnings in another online web page and
  will receive, hopefully, a refund of some of what I have paid.

Cool or what?  Makes paying taxes a pleasure :o)

Andrew

Happy to be fined!

From: "andrew cooke" <andrew@...>

Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2007 21:27:35 -0400 (CLT)

So I forgot to pay my tax on time.  And I after looking at an old form of
Paulina's realised I filled in the wrong box on the form last time.

I managed to correct the previous month (same amount, so it seems OK). 
And then I submitted last month's and it automatically calculated my fine!
 The whole process is so stressful - you have no idea how alien another
country's tax system is until you try to pay - that just getting the fine
to come up correctly felt like a huge success...

For future record - it's 84 b, not 84 a (and you work out the 10% yourself).

Andrew

Easier Online Procedure

From: "andrew cooke" <andrew@...>

Date: Sun, 6 Apr 2008 20:45:29 -0400 (CLT)

Until now I have been paying my AFP (obligatory pensions) contribution in
person, filling in a yellow slip and a cheque, and queueing once a month
at a bank-like payment place.  I couldn't use http://www.previred.cl (I
thought) because they force you to pay ISAPRE (health) too, and I was (1)
paying that automatically through my bank and (2) paying a different
amount from that calculated by previred because it's a joint insurance
with Paulina.

But today I just worked out how to do everything online.

First, go to http://www.safp.cl/safpstats/stats/inf_afiliados/calcos.html
and calculate the costs.  That's only the administration charge, but they
display the "tope" (the upper limit, which I exceed, and I never know
exactly what it is, since it changes daily).  So add the charge to 10% of
the tope.

Then go to http://www.previred.cl and (once logged in) select the "direct
pay" button below the "usual" buttons.  This lets you pay just the AFP! 
So fill in the amount calculated above, and everything is OK (assuming
that the ISAPRE is paid automatically and tax is done through
http://www.sii.cl )

Andrew

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