Thursday, February 08, 2007
I Want A Linux/Unix Utility To...
Via Rich Burridge, here's a great Linux/Unix applications list he's maintaining and improving. Good stuff!
Eyedrop Hell
I never thought it could be so hard to administer eye drops to a 5 year old girl. With a case of pinkeye recently picked up, my duty today was to keep the little one out of school and give her a drop in each eye three times. It's amazing how the survival instinct kicks in when you approach someones eyes with an object.
First I took my typical common sense negotiating route. For two hours we bandied back and forth:
I hate it when she pulls the politeness card.
We struggled. We yelled. I tried ultimatums, bargaining, dares, humour, every trick in my admittedly skinny book.
After two hours, Daddy's patience had worn razor thin. A quick google search yielded a Yahoo discussion thread suggesting something like the following:
1. Sit on the floor or bed.
2. Lay the child flat on her back, between your legs with her head between your thighs.
3. Place (or more accurately wrestle) her arms beneath each of your thighs.
4. Utilize your lower legs to pin hers if required.
5. Using two hands (and a modicum of force) administer said eyedrops.
6. Praise the child and deal with your guilt.
It worked flawlessly. What also amazed me was that once she blinked a few times and received several kisses from her pop, it was like it had never happened.
The next time was only slightly easier. Still a struggle, but less so. And papa's guilt was more easily buried.
You'd really think after all these years there'd be a better way.
First I took my typical common sense negotiating route. For two hours we bandied back and forth:
Me: You have to take the eyedrops. It will help get rid of the pinkeye. If you don't, you might not make it to so & so's birthday party on Saturday.
Her: No thank you daddy. I don't like eye drops.
I hate it when she pulls the politeness card.
We struggled. We yelled. I tried ultimatums, bargaining, dares, humour, every trick in my admittedly skinny book.
After two hours, Daddy's patience had worn razor thin. A quick google search yielded a Yahoo discussion thread suggesting something like the following:
1. Sit on the floor or bed.
2. Lay the child flat on her back, between your legs with her head between your thighs.
3. Place (or more accurately wrestle) her arms beneath each of your thighs.
4. Utilize your lower legs to pin hers if required.
5. Using two hands (and a modicum of force) administer said eyedrops.
6. Praise the child and deal with your guilt.
It worked flawlessly. What also amazed me was that once she blinked a few times and received several kisses from her pop, it was like it had never happened.
The next time was only slightly easier. Still a struggle, but less so. And papa's guilt was more easily buried.
You'd really think after all these years there'd be a better way.
Tuesday, February 06, 2007
Rawstudio 0.5 is out!
Another great release announced today is Rawstudio 0.5. There are several improvements, the most important to me being the incorporation of batch processing. I've been using a development version for a while now and I have to say as a Linux user who shoots almost all my stuff in RAW format, it's a great project. I find the workflow very efficient. It's nice to see so much work being done on this front.
Like all good open source projects, the developers are eager to improve the project and are willing to discuss all sorts of suggestions and ideas on the mailing list. If you're currently using ufraw or another application for your raw photo conversions you should really check this out, you might find it's just what you've been looking for.
Like all good open source projects, the developers are eager to improve the project and are willing to discuss all sorts of suggestions and ideas on the mailing list. If you're currently using ufraw or another application for your raw photo conversions you should really check this out, you might find it's just what you've been looking for.
Job's Thoughts on DRM
Interesting posting about DRM and music by Steve Jobs today. While I agree with much of what he says, I'm not so sure about:
Coming from the principal of a company that controls 80 odd percent of the personal digital music player market, it seems like he himself is indeed situated in a good spot to exert pressure on the big four music companies.
About the DRM-free alternative, he writes:
He clearly forgot the ending to that statement: '... if we weren't making millions with the status quo.'.
His posting is almost successful at putting Apple onside with DRM-free music (and against DRM) but then ends up putting the onus on everybody else to somehow exert pressure.
Why don't we exert the pressure on ALL OF THEM by supporting things like Creative Commons and Magnatune instead.
"Perhaps those unhappy with the current situation should redirect their energies towards persuading the music companies to sell their music DRM-free."
Coming from the principal of a company that controls 80 odd percent of the personal digital music player market, it seems like he himself is indeed situated in a good spot to exert pressure on the big four music companies.
About the DRM-free alternative, he writes:
"This is clearly the best alternative for consumers, and Apple would embrace it in a heartbeat. "
He clearly forgot the ending to that statement: '... if we weren't making millions with the status quo.'.
His posting is almost successful at putting Apple onside with DRM-free music (and against DRM) but then ends up putting the onus on everybody else to somehow exert pressure.
Why don't we exert the pressure on ALL OF THEM by supporting things like Creative Commons and Magnatune instead.
Google Reader Shortcut Fiesta
Over the last year or so I've become a fan of keyboard shortcuts (think Vim, Inkscape, Gmail, etc..). But I've largely stuck with mousing around in Google Reader... until now.
Lifehacker has a post with some really kickass Google Reader tips. The g+s and g+h shortcuts are time-savers, but the g+u+feedname is really really top notch.
If you're a Google Reader user, you really should check out that post.
Lifehacker has a post with some really kickass Google Reader tips. The g+s and g+h shortcuts are time-savers, but the g+u+feedname is really really top notch.
If you're a Google Reader user, you really should check out that post.
Seinfeld in Oz
If you like Seinfeld, and you've ever watched Oz (the series about life in a prison), then you should check this video out. Very well done.
Monday, February 05, 2007
Inkscape 0.45 Officially Released
Inkscape 0.45 was officially released today. If you're interested in a high quality open-source vector-based graphics editor, you can do no better. The latest version has an SVG gaussian blur feature along with several other enhancements and improvements. For more details and info on how to get it, visit inkscape.org.
Funny Pseudo-Anti-Mac Article/Rant
What do you get when you mash together sweeping generalizations, top-notch writing, sharp wit and the mac vs pc debate?
This article. [and hundreds of Digg comments as well ;-)]
He spends much of it taking the piss out Mac owners, so if you're sensitive in that respect, be forewarned. ;)
This article. [and hundreds of Digg comments as well ;-)]
He spends much of it taking the piss out Mac owners, so if you're sensitive in that respect, be forewarned. ;)
Google Reader Acting Up?
Is it just me or has Google Reader been notoriously buggy as of late? I've had numerous red 'Oops...' messages, feed lists that don't load first time around, and general buggy-ness over the past several days.
Perhaps some growing pains?
Perhaps some growing pains?
Sunday, February 04, 2007
Inkscape Screencast 3 - Reflected Text
I finally figured out how to increase the levels of my recently purchased Logitech USB Headset last night - originally I didn't see the menu choice to switch between devices in the sound dialog. And in light of getting it working, I decided to record another quick and dirty Inkscape screencast to test it out. The sound is miles better than the last one, but still not perfect. Anyways, if you're new to Inkscape you might find it useful.
Friday, February 02, 2007
USB Headset and Card Reader On Linux
I used a Christmas gift certificate to pick up a couple of toys at BestBuy today. I bought a Logitech 250 USB Headset and a LaCie imatumi multi-card reader.
The Card Reader:
I needed the card reader since we bought little one a Disney Digital Camera which of course wasn't recognized by Ubuntu, so to get the pictures off of its SD card I figured I'd get a multi-card reader and that way I could also pull pictures from my Rebel XT's CompactFlash card.
There was no installation to speak of really. I plugged my USB cable into the back of the card reader (it didn't come with one) and it was immediately recognized. I tried it with my Canon's CF card and it placed an icon on the desktop labeled "EOS_DIGITAL". Also, the normal Gnome dialog box asking me if I wanted to import the photos appeared immediately. Very slick. I also checked if F-Spot would see the card reader and it did without a hitch as well. I haven't done much with it yet so I can't comment on the speed, but it seemed to work fine.
The USB Headset:
I bought this with the intention of possibly doing some more screencasting. The second Inkscape screencast I posted on YouTube has generated almost 300 views and several positive comments. Quite gratifying actually. ;)
Anyways, based on some prior reading in the ubuntu forums, I didn't set my hopes too high on the Logitech USB Headset being recognized and fully functional. Then again, you are going to find mostly problematic stories on a help forum now aren't you.
I decided to shut the machine down, plug in the headset and restart. Upon login, I checked the device manager and sure enough the headset was there - nice. Next, I double clicked the speaker icon on the Gnome panel to check that the input levels were not muted and set to full. Firing up Audacity, there seemed to be some background sound but not coming from the headset mic. Turns out the old analog mic I had used the last time was still plugged in! Ripped that out and checked again. Still no audio showing up in Audacity... hmmm.
I then checked the Edit->Preferences in Audacity and under the Audio I/O setting, I saw a dropdown list for recording devices showing /dev/dsp and /dev/dsp1. I changed it from the former to the latter and voila! The sound of my silky smooth voice (okay...not so smooth, and more like polyester than silk) showed up on the meter and played back with surprisingly little background noise.
I then tried recording a quick screencast using ffmpeg (see my post about doing that back here) and soon realized it wasn't recording any sound. I checked the ffmpeg documentation and found that there is a switch which you can use to set the audio capture device. So I added "-ad /dev/dsp1" and presto chango I now had a screencast with nice clean audio.
Problems? Yes. I can't seem to get normal audio (mp3 playback etc.) to come through the headphones. While Audacity and ffmpeg will playback my recordings through the headphones, I can't get gxine, xmms, moc, or anything else to play back sound through them. I've posted about it on the ubuntu forums so hopefully this one will be solved soon.
Also, the recording levels in Audacity are set at max but the sound, while clear, is too low. The same thing for ffmpeg. I can't seem to find a setting in ffmpeg where I can set the audio levels. In terms of screencasts, I might be able to amplify the audio track in post processing, but it would be nice to get the levels up from the start.
I'm also interested in capturing my daughter's voice for posterity. Where my uncle used a leather cased cassette recorder 30 odd years ago to capture mine, I'd like to capture some of my daughter as well and getting the recording levels up in Audacity is pretty much required for that.
All in all, I'm very happy with the purchase (after only spending one evening with them) . I was able to set them up easily and they function as expected. Who knows, you might even see another screencast from me in the near future. ;)
Oh, I almost forgot. I was surrounded by Vista boxes while I was in there today. Vista here, Vista there, Vista everywhere! Everywhere I turned there seemed to be a VHS-looking case with a rounded corner! I didn't realize but the (cue monster-truck announcer voice) ULTIMATE edition was $499.00 CAD !! Yikes! I should have went in there and left a dozen Ubuntu CD's lying around on the shelves just for fun. ;)
Thursday, February 01, 2007
Now Here's Someone With Some Actual Talent!
To see some really talented cartooning and learn a few Inkscape related tips, check out John Bintz's post which has a screenshot image that gives a brief tour of some of the things John does with Inkscape to create his "A Moment of Clarity" comic. Neat!
Vista DRM - Educate Yourself
Sticking to the Vista-ish nature of a few previous posts, here's a link to New Zealand Computer Science researcher Peter Gutmann's paper "A Cost Analysis of Windows Vista Content Protection". It spells out in great detail the potentially crippling nature of Vista's DRM system.
While this is potentially good news for the Linux community (the more Vista sucks, the better for us - at least on the face of it), the section on the potential elimination of open-source hardware support is very worrying.
In any case, if you're at all into finding out what DRM limitations are present in the newest version of Windows, you should give it a read.
While this is potentially good news for the Linux community (the more Vista sucks, the better for us - at least on the face of it), the section on the potential elimination of open-source hardware support is very worrying.
In any case, if you're at all into finding out what DRM limitations are present in the newest version of Windows, you should give it a read.
Linux vs Vista
If your interested in Vista vs. Linux comparisons, Earl Moore at Meandering Passage sent me a link to an ongoing series of articles over at eWeek. Thanks Earl!
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
Flickr changes - Much Ado About Nothing?
While I would prefer that Flickr not set limits on the number of contacts a user can have, or the maximum number of tags that can be placed on a photo, after reading the arguments for and against in the Flickr forums I find myself coming to a few conclusions:
1. Yeah, merging the Flickr and Yahoo logins sounds wishy-washy. But after doing it, logging out and logging back in, I fail to see what difference it makes. Sure I go to a Yahoo login page, but I enter my username and password and I'm in. As simple as before. No URL changes to my photo stream. Why is this such a pain for some people? When I switched to the new Blogger I had to change my login to my gmail login info. No complaint here. No fuss anywhere else it seems either.
2. The 3000 contact per user limit is so well and truly above what I'll ever need that it simply doesn't register as a problem to me. How anyone could effectively follow the work of 3000 other photographers sounds ridiculous to start with. But there just has to be a better, more efficient way to do this if that is your goal.
3. Applying 75 tags to a photo seems outlandish to me. Sometimes simplicity is a benefit. Maybe this will force people to be a little more efficient with their descriptions. I think if you can't adequately describe your photo in less than 76 tags, you have a few too many subjects in your photo.
4. It appears that these changes will affect a minute (but vocal) portion of the Flickr user base. It is being done in the name of site performance. You either believe Flickr or you think they're liars. If you think they're liars, you should move your photos somewhere else now.
5. Blogs seem to be reporting on this as if Flickr users everywhere are in the midst of revolt. Thomas Hawk (who it should be said, is also the CEO of a competing service and a Flickr user) is probably the most prominent blogger engaged in this issue. But if you go read the Flickr forums you will find that there are quite a few Flickr users who are NOT in revolt, but who are perfectly content with the coming changes. Don't be misled by antagonistic blog posts telling you otherwise.
6. This is how a market is supposed to work. If Flickr ends up screwing it's users and the users get pissed off enough, they'll move to a competitor. That's the way it should work. If Flickr makes the changes and users remain happy, then it succeeds.
7. Just because Flickr is a social networking site, doesn't mean it's owned by the users. I'm have a paid Pro Flickr account, but I make no insinuations that I should have final call on business decisions. As long as they are not violating the Terms of Service I agreed to, I have no argument.
Currently Flickr is providing a great service for me. If they piss me off enough, I leave. Simple.
1. Yeah, merging the Flickr and Yahoo logins sounds wishy-washy. But after doing it, logging out and logging back in, I fail to see what difference it makes. Sure I go to a Yahoo login page, but I enter my username and password and I'm in. As simple as before. No URL changes to my photo stream. Why is this such a pain for some people? When I switched to the new Blogger I had to change my login to my gmail login info. No complaint here. No fuss anywhere else it seems either.
2. The 3000 contact per user limit is so well and truly above what I'll ever need that it simply doesn't register as a problem to me. How anyone could effectively follow the work of 3000 other photographers sounds ridiculous to start with. But there just has to be a better, more efficient way to do this if that is your goal.
3. Applying 75 tags to a photo seems outlandish to me. Sometimes simplicity is a benefit. Maybe this will force people to be a little more efficient with their descriptions. I think if you can't adequately describe your photo in less than 76 tags, you have a few too many subjects in your photo.
4. It appears that these changes will affect a minute (but vocal) portion of the Flickr user base. It is being done in the name of site performance. You either believe Flickr or you think they're liars. If you think they're liars, you should move your photos somewhere else now.
5. Blogs seem to be reporting on this as if Flickr users everywhere are in the midst of revolt. Thomas Hawk (who it should be said, is also the CEO of a competing service and a Flickr user) is probably the most prominent blogger engaged in this issue. But if you go read the Flickr forums you will find that there are quite a few Flickr users who are NOT in revolt, but who are perfectly content with the coming changes. Don't be misled by antagonistic blog posts telling you otherwise.
6. This is how a market is supposed to work. If Flickr ends up screwing it's users and the users get pissed off enough, they'll move to a competitor. That's the way it should work. If Flickr makes the changes and users remain happy, then it succeeds.
7. Just because Flickr is a social networking site, doesn't mean it's owned by the users. I'm have a paid Pro Flickr account, but I make no insinuations that I should have final call on business decisions. As long as they are not violating the Terms of Service I agreed to, I have no argument.
Currently Flickr is providing a great service for me. If they piss me off enough, I leave. Simple.
Enough With The Insane Beryl Demos Already!!
It's no secret that I run Linux. More specifically I run Ubuntu 6.10 and use Beryl. I'm quite happy and satisfied with it.
Now since Vista has launched, can somebody point me to a good demo video touting it's interface features? While you're at it, please provide a link to a good video demo of the OS-X desktop.
W-w-what the hell? - you might ask. Why would I ask for these things?
I'll tell you why. I believe that Beryl and Linux can provide at least the equal of the visual desktop experience of Vista or OS-X (and with much lower hardware requirements). Compiz and Beryl have come so far so quickly in their development that it's hard to imagine they won't surpass the capabilities of the other two in fairly short order. But here's the rub:
Almost every Beryl demo I've seen cited on Digg and other sites has been a mish-mash of anime wallpaper, speedmetal and hyperfast cube-spinning and window switching. I'd like to be able to show a co-worker or friend a well produced demo of the actual practical capabilites of the Linux+Compiz/Beryl desktop without resorting to the goth-wallpapered, death-metal soundtrack demos I see all over the place.
What better way to convert would-be Vista or OSX users than by offering real-world high production value demonstrations similar to those produced in their own camps. Let's make the demos match them not only in capabilities, but in taste and style as well. It's hard to argue when you can demonstrate the same functionality.
Burning menus down in flames or exploding title bars might be neat, but they don't exactly bolster the argument for our side.
Anybody got any OS-X or Vista demos they care to hold up as shining examples of what a desktop OS should be?
Or of course, if you can point me to a Beryl or Compiz video that already does this, all the better.
Now since Vista has launched, can somebody point me to a good demo video touting it's interface features? While you're at it, please provide a link to a good video demo of the OS-X desktop.
W-w-what the hell? - you might ask. Why would I ask for these things?
I'll tell you why. I believe that Beryl and Linux can provide at least the equal of the visual desktop experience of Vista or OS-X (and with much lower hardware requirements). Compiz and Beryl have come so far so quickly in their development that it's hard to imagine they won't surpass the capabilities of the other two in fairly short order. But here's the rub:
Almost every Beryl demo I've seen cited on Digg and other sites has been a mish-mash of anime wallpaper, speedmetal and hyperfast cube-spinning and window switching. I'd like to be able to show a co-worker or friend a well produced demo of the actual practical capabilites of the Linux+Compiz/Beryl desktop without resorting to the goth-wallpapered, death-metal soundtrack demos I see all over the place.
What better way to convert would-be Vista or OSX users than by offering real-world high production value demonstrations similar to those produced in their own camps. Let's make the demos match them not only in capabilities, but in taste and style as well. It's hard to argue when you can demonstrate the same functionality.
Burning menus down in flames or exploding title bars might be neat, but they don't exactly bolster the argument for our side.
Anybody got any OS-X or Vista demos they care to hold up as shining examples of what a desktop OS should be?
Or of course, if you can point me to a Beryl or Compiz video that already does this, all the better.
Snap Previews or How To Annoy Your Readers
The relatively recent advent of the Snap Preview plugin seems to be annoying just about everyone. Although it does have its defenders.
You can immediately chalk me up as hating them. It's almost as annoying as those double-underlined thingys that are annoyingly prevalent on some sites (like linuxquestions.org) which pop up adds when you hover on them. (what are they called anyway?)
As an aside, I haven't been linking nearly enough in my posts as of late. Expect to see more links here in the future. None of them Snap Previews and none of them double-underlined either.
You can immediately chalk me up as hating them. It's almost as annoying as those double-underlined thingys that are annoyingly prevalent on some sites (like linuxquestions.org) which pop up adds when you hover on them. (what are they called anyway?)
As an aside, I haven't been linking nearly enough in my posts as of late. Expect to see more links here in the future. None of them Snap Previews and none of them double-underlined either.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Underwhelmed But Happy About It
Earl Moore is underwhelmed by the relatively quiet launch of Vista. Actually I haven't been paying much attention to Vista simply because I'm almost well and truly Linux-ized (is there actually a term for that? - there should be..)
However I did know about it since I caught 5 minutes of CNN this morning where Miles O'Brien talked a bit about it, showing an interview clip with Bill Gates and discussing it very briefly with their financial guy. I shook my head a little and chuckled when Miles ended the segment by stating that a lot of people were saying that Vista brought the Windows desktop experience up to OS-X standards and perhaps more importantly ended off with the comment that people could upgrade to Vista or "just get a Mac". I betcha Microsoft PR was just gleeful hearing that comment this morning. ;)
I also had a couple of co-workers discussing Vista with me today. Of course I took the opportunity to nod repeatedly - yes it looks quite flashy... yes it supposedly requires lots more hardware power... yes it supposedly really cracks down on pirated applications and media.. ever heard of Linux?... I actually run it at home...yes it is actually free...
The impression I get is that while Vista will be no outright failure (it'll be installed on virtually every PC you buy) there are more and more Linux and Mac types who will have more and more conversations with their non-techie co-workers and friends just suggesting (not pushing it down their throats) that there *are* alternatives out there. My feeling is that while MS is not ceding it's king of the hill status any time soon, the earth is slowly eroding under their feet. It may take a long while, but I think it is happening right now.
Combine all those water cooler conversations with the fact that the OS itself might be of diminishing importance as more and more services reside on the net irrespective of OS. The resurgence of gaming consoles at the expense of PC-based gaming also makes switching from Windows to something else significantly easier.
The fact that the launch didn't seem to generate much fanfare only bodes well for the future in my mind. It would be nice to see some real market competition in OS's again.
However I did know about it since I caught 5 minutes of CNN this morning where Miles O'Brien talked a bit about it, showing an interview clip with Bill Gates and discussing it very briefly with their financial guy. I shook my head a little and chuckled when Miles ended the segment by stating that a lot of people were saying that Vista brought the Windows desktop experience up to OS-X standards and perhaps more importantly ended off with the comment that people could upgrade to Vista or "just get a Mac". I betcha Microsoft PR was just gleeful hearing that comment this morning. ;)
I also had a couple of co-workers discussing Vista with me today. Of course I took the opportunity to nod repeatedly - yes it looks quite flashy... yes it supposedly requires lots more hardware power... yes it supposedly really cracks down on pirated applications and media.. ever heard of Linux?... I actually run it at home...yes it is actually free...
The impression I get is that while Vista will be no outright failure (it'll be installed on virtually every PC you buy) there are more and more Linux and Mac types who will have more and more conversations with their non-techie co-workers and friends just suggesting (not pushing it down their throats) that there *are* alternatives out there. My feeling is that while MS is not ceding it's king of the hill status any time soon, the earth is slowly eroding under their feet. It may take a long while, but I think it is happening right now.
Combine all those water cooler conversations with the fact that the OS itself might be of diminishing importance as more and more services reside on the net irrespective of OS. The resurgence of gaming consoles at the expense of PC-based gaming also makes switching from Windows to something else significantly easier.
The fact that the launch didn't seem to generate much fanfare only bodes well for the future in my mind. It would be nice to see some real market competition in OS's again.
Monday, January 29, 2007
Some Cross-Border Observations
Back from the annual trek down to Myrtle Beach. As you can see from the photo above, we didn't let the mid-50F weather hinder us too much. It's going down to a balmy 5F here tonight, so you can see how to us, mid-50's was A-ok.
It was kinda funny sitting on the beach barefoot, making a couple of sandcastles, my daughter running knee-deep into the icy Atlantic to get water. All the while, people were trudging by with heavier coats (some even wearing winter hats!) giving a polite smile to the two lone crazies on the beach.
At the risk of generalizing far too much, here's a quick, completely un-researched set of observations (some serious and some silly) I made about the U.S. while I was down there this week. Hopefully it might generate some comment, and hopefully not any harsh feelings. Take these with a grain of salt, and of course preface just about everything with 'in the small part of the US that we were in...'
In no particular order:
1. You seem to have pre-pay for gas everywhere that we went. I never seem to have to do this up here. Although I don't frequent downtown Toronto gas stations that often, I don't ever remember having to pay before I pump (unless it's via debit/credit card at the pump).
2. Southern hospitality is definitely not a myth. The hotel, airport and restaurant staff we dealt with seemed significantly more friendly and helpful than they are around here.
3. Maybe it's just me, but it always seems like the US is lacking in middle class. There seem to be a lot of people with large cars, large homes and money to burn, and a lot of people with very little. Homes seem either huge and pretty or small and decrepit. A lot of people at each end of the scale and not so many in-between. Up here it seems like there are a lot more people "in-between".
4. There are a lot of abandoned buildings and malls. Stores move to new locations and the old malls remain partially empty or completely abandoned. This seems more prevalent in Western NY, but I saw the same thing in Myrtle Beach. In southern Ontario old buildings get torn down and replaced, they're not just left to sit. I'm not sure why this is so. Maybe it's the real estate laws, or maybe something else.
5. People in the states seem to eat out at restaurants *a lot*. In Cheektowaga I was mystified as to why the IHOP was full of people at 9pm. Granted Myrtle Beach is a bit skewed as it is full of tourist-types, but even the smallest, greasiest looking places seem to be doing a brisk business on week nights.
6. Portions in US restaurants are huge compared to those here. My in-laws love this since they are all about the portion vs. cost relationship. I won't lie. My belly loves this also. But when you order a plate of spaghetti from the kid's menu you get a full size heap of pasta along with a huge side of fries. My daughter is currently in veggie rehab since arriving back. It does seem like you're getting ripped off when you get back here. ;)
7. Quality fruits and veggies seem in short supply in the grocery stores. And the stuff they do have is significantly more expensive than it is here. I noticed this in Western NY as well as down south. Maybe something to do with the freeze in California?
8. This is weird, but I noticed a lot of people buying food in gas bar/convenience stores. To me it is strange to see a guy perusing the hot cashews or hotdog rollers in a gas bar. I had to line up behind 6 people at a convenience store when buying some milk. Four of those six people were buying food to eat (Little Debbie cakes, microwaved sandwiches and the like). Our gas bars have a small refrigerated section holding microwavable sandwiches, but I've never in the past ten years actually seen anyone buying or eating them.
9. Gospel shows and Evangelicals seem to clog the Sunday morning cable channels. While we have our fair share of evangelicals on Sunday mornings, you definitely see and notice how religion seems to play a much more prominent role in the US. The alternatives seemed to be infomercials out the wazoo. It was either finding God, getting ripped abs, or running whole meals through a juicer!
Americans and Canadians share so much culture that it's hard to believe you could ever tell the difference. It's actually quite surprising that there are any differences at all, but there are.
Have I generalized too much, have I got it all wrong? Please educate me.
Thursday, January 18, 2007
Rawstudio, partitioning, screencasts and more!
In the midst of fending off pre-vacation work overload a few bits and bobs have been occupying my spare time. Think of this as my pre-vacation brain dump:
Another call to my ISP confirmed that they had already sent me a replacement DSL modem. It arrived this past Wednesday, was installed that evening and seems to have cured all that ails me in the connectivity department.
I've also been learning a little about partitioning in Linux. I've shrunk my ntfs partition and created a separate 60GB partition for my photos. It took a little doing, but with a little (ok..a lot of) help with the great people on ubuntuforums.org I managed to get it accomplished and learned something in the process.
I've also joined the Ubuntu screencasts team (at the behest of Will Simpson) to see if I can contribute something to the community there. We'll see if I ever get the time (and the USB mic), but hey, I'm always up for a challenge.
Another thing worthy of noting is that Rawstudio is *really* coming along nicely. This is a free and open source app that handles RAW image conversion for Linux. The latest patches have implemented batch processing - something Rawstudio users have been waiting for a long time. Kudos to AndersK and AndersB for creating such a great app! It's still a small group, so any issues I've brought up on the Rawstudio mailing list have been answered very quickly. Clearly digital photography workflow on Linux is already well developed and like everything else in the Linux space, things are progressing at a fast and furious pace. It's kind of nice to be somewhat involved the process too. ;)
Again, the world of Linux is broadening my knowledge. With Rawstudio, in order to get the latest patches I had to get accustomed to checking out the source from subversion, applying patch files and compiling. With a few quick questions to the friendly guys on the Rawstudio mailing list, I was up and running the latest patches no problem.
So that's where I sit at the moment. Living, learning and not blogging about it often enough ;) Some things never seem to change.
Another call to my ISP confirmed that they had already sent me a replacement DSL modem. It arrived this past Wednesday, was installed that evening and seems to have cured all that ails me in the connectivity department.
I've also been learning a little about partitioning in Linux. I've shrunk my ntfs partition and created a separate 60GB partition for my photos. It took a little doing, but with a little (ok..a lot of) help with the great people on ubuntuforums.org I managed to get it accomplished and learned something in the process.
I've also joined the Ubuntu screencasts team (at the behest of Will Simpson) to see if I can contribute something to the community there. We'll see if I ever get the time (and the USB mic), but hey, I'm always up for a challenge.
Another thing worthy of noting is that Rawstudio is *really* coming along nicely. This is a free and open source app that handles RAW image conversion for Linux. The latest patches have implemented batch processing - something Rawstudio users have been waiting for a long time. Kudos to AndersK and AndersB for creating such a great app! It's still a small group, so any issues I've brought up on the Rawstudio mailing list have been answered very quickly. Clearly digital photography workflow on Linux is already well developed and like everything else in the Linux space, things are progressing at a fast and furious pace. It's kind of nice to be somewhat involved the process too. ;)
Again, the world of Linux is broadening my knowledge. With Rawstudio, in order to get the latest patches I had to get accustomed to checking out the source from subversion, applying patch files and compiling. With a few quick questions to the friendly guys on the Rawstudio mailing list, I was up and running the latest patches no problem.
So that's where I sit at the moment. Living, learning and not blogging about it often enough ;) Some things never seem to change.
Pre-Vacation Stress Disorder
Is there such a thing as pre vacation stress disorder ? (No doubt there is.) Why is it that so many clients somehow sense that I'm about to go away for a week and decide on Wednesday to ask for meetings and drawings to be ready for Friday? E.S.P? Bahh.Half a day at work tomorrow to clean up some last minute stuff and we're off for the annual trek down to Myrtle Beach SC. Yeah yeah, I know, the weather's not the greatest right now. But for us to walk along the beach - even in a sweater or jacket - in January is still a treat. Remember, January for us is regularly well below 0C (32F) so anything in the 50's is ok by me.
This time we're driving to Buffalo (only a couple of hours) and then staying over night and catching a plane to (I think) Charlotte and then direct into Myrtle. Last time we flew to Raleigh-Durham and it left us with a 4 hour drive. Better than 17 hrs of driving but still a pain. This time we'll be leaving Buffalo by 8am and into Myrtle by 12. Fuddruckers here I come!! :)
If I'm lucky I might even find the time to throw up a post or two while I'm gone. ;)
Monday, January 15, 2007
Random Notes on Random Notes...
Reading through Hugh McLeod's random notes on blogging, I realized he had both missed something and illustrated something at the same time. Blogging with humility *and* blogging with authority are not mutually exclusive.
Humility builds respect and adds to your authority, arrogance and snarky-ness take away from it.
Hugh's list reads very snarky to me. Almost snarky for snarky's sake. Good for building readership maybe, not so good for building authority IMO.
Doc Searls (and Jon Udell) on the other hand, are masters at blogging with authority sans arrogance.
Humility builds respect and adds to your authority, arrogance and snarky-ness take away from it.
Hugh's list reads very snarky to me. Almost snarky for snarky's sake. Good for building readership maybe, not so good for building authority IMO.
Doc Searls (and Jon Udell) on the other hand, are masters at blogging with authority sans arrogance.
Clever 90's Flowchart
I think you probably have to be from a specific generation to even get this, nevermind find it funny (which I did):
Friday, January 12, 2007
More Inkscape Fun - Subtle Adjustments Can Make Big Changes
With Christmas, Little One's birthday, New Years and Evelyn's 100th birthday, it feels like the holiday that will never end! Tomorrow is Em's birthday party with her classmates and friends. So maybe, just maybe, I'll find more time to put towards this blogging endeavour once again.
In the meantime, a couple of Inkscape related things...
The About Inkscape 0.45 contest over on deviantArt has closed and a winner has been chosen!! No, I didn't get shortlisted or picked, but it was fun creating a few entries and there are some real nice ones. Congrats to molumen who created the winning entry. Very sharp!
Over the holiday I did manage to do a little noodling with Inkscape 0.45 (which is not officially out yet). One of the main updates in the latest version is the blur functionality. How it get implemented in a vector-based drawing tool is way over my head but I love it just the same. ;)
Here's a series of buttons I created which illustrate how very simple and subtle changes can have a significant impact on graphics:
All of these buttons are created in Inkscape with only either 3 or 4 objects. The button itself consists of a solid circle, a highlight semicircle (made with a simple boolean intersection of a circle and a polygon) and a text object - the letter. I've used an additional blurred circle object for buttons B,C and D.
Button A looks kind of shiny because I've left the highlight grey object (which is actually a solid white object with its opacity reduced to around 40%) as a solid color - that is without any gradient. So you see the hard edge from grey to black. This button only consists of 3 objects, the black circle, the grey (transparent white) highlight object and the green text. Looks ok I guess.
Button B isn't a heck of a lot different from Button A. I've made 2 simple changes here. Actually the first is just to change the text from A to B. Inkscape is nice in that you can just double-click on the text and immediately edit it in place. The second more meaningful change is to duplicate the black circle, blur it and set it back behind the button (but above the blue background). This gives more of a photorealistic look in my opinion. It's not quite a drop shadow but I think it enhances the button. You can use this method to enhance many different kinds of graphics when you want to maybe add impact, depth or emphasis to some object and yet be subtle about it.
Button C is identical to Button B except that I changed the blurred circle underneath to a light blue colour instead of black. this kind of gives a backlit effect. Not so subtle but maybe useful in moderation when you're looking for that effect. I see a lot of building signage with this look. They slightly raise the letters off the building and light behind them. You can go quite brazen with this effect or keep it subtle as I've done here. Again, it's just a simple blurred circle beneath the base button object.
Button D looks significantly different from the previous ones, but is the result of only one simple change. In fact it is exactle the same as button B, except that I've taken the grey highlight object and applied a gradient so that instead of a solid grey, it goes from a solid grey at the top to transparent at the bottom. You can see here how a simple change to the highlight gives a completely different feel to the object. Instead of shiny you get something a lot more matte. Again, a very simple change makes a significant difference to the image.
Button E is really just academic. I've taken button D and removed the blurred black circle behind the button. So it is effectively button A with a gradient applied to the highlight shape instead of a solid grey.
Hopefully someone will find this useful. Inkscape makes it so easy to experiment and play around that you find new things out all the time. If you spot some graphic or effect that you love while cruising the net, don't think it's impossible to create. Just stare at it and imagine how you might achieve those effects in something like Inkscape. It's usually much easier than you think. ;)
In the meantime, a couple of Inkscape related things...
The About Inkscape 0.45 contest over on deviantArt has closed and a winner has been chosen!! No, I didn't get shortlisted or picked, but it was fun creating a few entries and there are some real nice ones. Congrats to molumen who created the winning entry. Very sharp!
Over the holiday I did manage to do a little noodling with Inkscape 0.45 (which is not officially out yet). One of the main updates in the latest version is the blur functionality. How it get implemented in a vector-based drawing tool is way over my head but I love it just the same. ;)
Here's a series of buttons I created which illustrate how very simple and subtle changes can have a significant impact on graphics:
All of these buttons are created in Inkscape with only either 3 or 4 objects. The button itself consists of a solid circle, a highlight semicircle (made with a simple boolean intersection of a circle and a polygon) and a text object - the letter. I've used an additional blurred circle object for buttons B,C and D.
Button A looks kind of shiny because I've left the highlight grey object (which is actually a solid white object with its opacity reduced to around 40%) as a solid color - that is without any gradient. So you see the hard edge from grey to black. This button only consists of 3 objects, the black circle, the grey (transparent white) highlight object and the green text. Looks ok I guess.
Button B isn't a heck of a lot different from Button A. I've made 2 simple changes here. Actually the first is just to change the text from A to B. Inkscape is nice in that you can just double-click on the text and immediately edit it in place. The second more meaningful change is to duplicate the black circle, blur it and set it back behind the button (but above the blue background). This gives more of a photorealistic look in my opinion. It's not quite a drop shadow but I think it enhances the button. You can use this method to enhance many different kinds of graphics when you want to maybe add impact, depth or emphasis to some object and yet be subtle about it.
Button C is identical to Button B except that I changed the blurred circle underneath to a light blue colour instead of black. this kind of gives a backlit effect. Not so subtle but maybe useful in moderation when you're looking for that effect. I see a lot of building signage with this look. They slightly raise the letters off the building and light behind them. You can go quite brazen with this effect or keep it subtle as I've done here. Again, it's just a simple blurred circle beneath the base button object.
Button D looks significantly different from the previous ones, but is the result of only one simple change. In fact it is exactle the same as button B, except that I've taken the grey highlight object and applied a gradient so that instead of a solid grey, it goes from a solid grey at the top to transparent at the bottom. You can see here how a simple change to the highlight gives a completely different feel to the object. Instead of shiny you get something a lot more matte. Again, a very simple change makes a significant difference to the image.
Button E is really just academic. I've taken button D and removed the blurred black circle behind the button. So it is effectively button A with a gradient applied to the highlight shape instead of a solid grey.Hopefully someone will find this useful. Inkscape makes it so easy to experiment and play around that you find new things out all the time. If you spot some graphic or effect that you love while cruising the net, don't think it's impossible to create. Just stare at it and imagine how you might achieve those effects in something like Inkscape. It's usually much easier than you think. ;)
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Brief Revisit to XP - DSL Problems and Kudos to Earl
I've been having intermittent problems with my DSL service over the past couple of months. After behaving itself through most of December, it seems to have reared it's ugly head again in the past couple of weeks. I won't go very far into it except to say that it sometimes drops the connection and resyncs every 30 seconds. Other days it stays up steady for hours.
Tonight I got frustrated enough to call technical support. But before I did, I decided to boot up into XP so that I wouldn't frighten the tech support staff away by telling them I'm running Linux. Of course my worry is that once they hear I'm running Linux they'll claim that they don't support that OS and possibly put the blame for my troubles squarely on that.
Now it's been months since I've booted this machine into XP and after 10 minutes I noted three things:
1. Man.. does it ever take a long time to get to a workable desktop!
2. Man.. does it ever load a gi-normous amount of applets into the system tray!
3. Man.. does it ever hound you about updating spyware databases, anti-virus updates, windows system updates, and firewall software updates!
It's amazing how many little bubbles can pop up once you don't boot XP for a couple of months. If there's one thing I love about running Linux (and the Mac guys are no different) is that you don't have to be running 5 different third party security apps every time you boot up. I made the mistake of double-clicking Firefox before all the applets were loaded, so it took almost a minute for it to appear - all this on a P4-3GHz machine with 1GB of ram. Good god man!
Now just like when you hear a rattle in your car for a week but it seems to disappear when you bring the car in for service, my DSL seemed to be working fine almost the whole time I was on the phone with tech support. But after 10 minutes of describing and discussing the problem, he noted that my line was showing NO DSL service at all from his end. All this while I was clicking and browsing the web. So definitely something is up with the line. He created a ticket (whatever that is) for me and told me my problem was a level 2 tech support staff issue and that they would contact me within a few days. I guess it was out of his league.
So in the end I never had to run through the usual check of DSL settings and connectivity settings in the OS, which means I never really had to boot into XP anyway but at least it reminded me of why I started running Linux. :)
In a related note, Earl Moore has a nice writeup of his opinions on running Ubuntu. He gives some honest and practical comparisons between XP, Ubuntu and OS X. And while he prefers OS X (yes Earl, it *is* a slick interface, I'll give them that), he's honest in his criticisms and praise of Ubuntu. And kudos to him for trying it out before giving his opinions - nice to hear some realistic non-fanboy real world comparisons.
I've never really criticized OS X either way since I've never tried it (apart from clicking around on a few machines in the Apple store a couple of times). I'm not a huge fan of Apple's proprietary nature (nor Microsoft's) but I do realize they've set the bar for UI design. It, (along with honest criticism like Earl's) gives the desktop Linux community something to shoot for. I think it's getting there, it's only a matter of time.
Friday, January 05, 2007
A New Lens for New Years
With a little help (actually a lot of help) from the camera store gift certificate my wife gave me, I picked up a Canon 85mm f/1.8 lens last weekend. I haven't had a lot of time to play with it other than shooting my favourite subject (my daughter).
As is becoming tradition, we headed across the border and stayed two nights in Lockport NY over New Years. It's a short drive and my wife tells me the shopping is mucho fantastico ;) Anyways, I managed to take some shots at the pool, most of which turned out pretty good. One unfortunate mistake was that I had originally set the camera for ISO 800 in order to freeze some splashing fun, but forgot to switch it back until many shots later. So the digital noise in some of them is a little annoying. I haven't managed to convert or upload any of them yet, but here's a quick sample of what was probably one of the best shots, and a 100% crop to give an idea of the sharpness:
Crop at 100%:
Things I Learned:
1. When you play with a high ISO, don't forget to switch it back.
2. I have a tendency to shoot wide open (f1.8) too often. A shallow depth of field is effective but overdoing it is not. I have several shots of my daughter with one eye nice and sharp and the other quite soft. Doesn't make for the greatest photo.
3. Kind of related to #2, using an extremely shallow depth of field can also throw off the focus. Even though the autofocus is good, I still sometimes ended up with soft faces and sharp backgrounds, especially on the moving subject shots. Using f2.8 might have minimized this problem.
4. Don't be afraid to take a lot of shots. I probably have 20 shots of my daughter getting into and out of the pool (nevermind all the close-ups). Probably 3 of those 20 are keepers. If I hadn't taken all those shots, I probably would have ended up with no keepers. Don't forget you can always delete them. Not every shot is going to be a good one. Increase the number of shots you take and increase your chances.
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Big Gramma turns 100!
[Update: Evelyn and the clan made the evening newscast! Click here to check it out. Also make sure to see our little one tap dancing at around the 1 minute mark!!]
My wife's grandmother turns 100 today! Up until about 7 months ago, she was still living on her own in her own house, and up until a few years ago, was shovelling her own snow (until neighbours and family finally gave her enough guff about it to stop). My esteemed brother-in-law, who posts far too infrequently, but is never short of words when he does, gives a nice summary of the wonderful lady right here. If you'd like to leave good wishes, head over there and comment.
If there's one thing I treasure about Evelyn, it is her sense of humour. While as prim and proper as you'd ever want while out socializing, she could always be trusted to trade crude humour with yours truly.
A few of the wonderfully naughty sayings (mostly Welsh in origin I'd imagine) that she's taught me over the years:
1. She was like shit to a blanket. (describing a whining needy child)
2. He couldn't drive a stiff dick into a tub of lard.
3. Short and thick does the trick, but long and thin will get it in.
4. It was so long that you could wrap it around and make a jug-handle out of it.
Ev's had some trouble with the hearing aids lately, and has moved into a retirement home in the last few months, but she's still pretty mobile. And as frail as she might be getting, her spirit is still fully intact.
Watching her enjoy a healthy shot of Baileys while we opened gifts during the holidays was truly a wonderful thing.
Hope everyone had a wonderful past couple of weeks too.
My wife's grandmother turns 100 today! Up until about 7 months ago, she was still living on her own in her own house, and up until a few years ago, was shovelling her own snow (until neighbours and family finally gave her enough guff about it to stop). My esteemed brother-in-law, who posts far too infrequently, but is never short of words when he does, gives a nice summary of the wonderful lady right here. If you'd like to leave good wishes, head over there and comment.
If there's one thing I treasure about Evelyn, it is her sense of humour. While as prim and proper as you'd ever want while out socializing, she could always be trusted to trade crude humour with yours truly.
A few of the wonderfully naughty sayings (mostly Welsh in origin I'd imagine) that she's taught me over the years:
1. She was like shit to a blanket. (describing a whining needy child)
2. He couldn't drive a stiff dick into a tub of lard.
3. Short and thick does the trick, but long and thin will get it in.
4. It was so long that you could wrap it around and make a jug-handle out of it.
Ev's had some trouble with the hearing aids lately, and has moved into a retirement home in the last few months, but she's still pretty mobile. And as frail as she might be getting, her spirit is still fully intact.
Watching her enjoy a healthy shot of Baileys while we opened gifts during the holidays was truly a wonderful thing.
Hope everyone had a wonderful past couple of weeks too.
Inkscape 0.45 About Screen - Final Entries
The Inkscape 0.45 About Screen deadline for entries has passed and now votes are being tallied on the submissions. While it doesn't look good for my three entries, there are some very very talented people out there. So many awesome entries! Check them out.
Friday, December 29, 2006
Birthday Celebration - On Ice and In Chinese
Our Almost-Five year old finally turned Five today. :)
We went to see Disney on Ice at the SkyDome ..er.. Rogers Centre today to celebrate. The show was a lot of fun (although I'm miles away and no closer to being a figure-skating fan than I was before).
We got monetarily raped in the process of getting a couple of souvenirs for our sweetheart. This (pointless) spinning glow-in-the-dark Tinkerbell contraption was the only thing worth getting really. It was funny when a mother in the next seat asked me how much it cost, I told her "twenty bucks ... about 17 bucks more than it should have!". Such is the Disney empire.
After that we did a late lunch at a nice Chinese restaurant. This was the absolute highlight of the day since the restaurant was nearly empty and upon bringing Em a chocolate sundae, two employees fully versed in the karaoke experience, along with microphones and accompanying backing track, sang Happy Birthday to our daughter in both English and Chinese. Very very nice.
It kind of reminded me of the scene in A Christmas Story when the family goes out for Chinese food on Christmas Day. :)
We went to see Disney on Ice at the SkyDome ..er.. Rogers Centre today to celebrate. The show was a lot of fun (although I'm miles away and no closer to being a figure-skating fan than I was before).
We got monetarily raped in the process of getting a couple of souvenirs for our sweetheart. This (pointless) spinning glow-in-the-dark Tinkerbell contraption was the only thing worth getting really. It was funny when a mother in the next seat asked me how much it cost, I told her "twenty bucks ... about 17 bucks more than it should have!". Such is the Disney empire.
After that we did a late lunch at a nice Chinese restaurant. This was the absolute highlight of the day since the restaurant was nearly empty and upon bringing Em a chocolate sundae, two employees fully versed in the karaoke experience, along with microphones and accompanying backing track, sang Happy Birthday to our daughter in both English and Chinese. Very very nice.
It kind of reminded me of the scene in A Christmas Story when the family goes out for Chinese food on Christmas Day. :)
Please Indulge Me For A Moment
Please indulge me for a moment. As you can see on the top of this page (unless you're reading through an aggregator) I've toyed about with a new blog header image and finally came up with something I kind of like. Let me know if it works for you - or not.
I created it in Inkscape and it kind of came about as I was creating my three entries for the Inkscape 0.45 About dialog box contest over on deviantArt (which I posted about a short time ago). You can check out my three entries right here. You'll notice that my new blog header image is similar in concept to my third deviantArt entry.
Inkscape 0.45 (which is about to be released shortly) has a new blur feature which I've put to use here in moving those small tiddlywinks to the background. I've gone away from the shiny floor reflection since it's oh so 2006. (psst - actually I still like that effect but don't go telling anyone).
Anyways, I toyed with the thought of revamping the look of the blog completely for the start of the new year, but actually decided I still quite like the blue background. I will however make it my mission to update my blogroll and add my Flickr zeitgeist widget over on the right when I have time.
Let me know what you think.
I created it in Inkscape and it kind of came about as I was creating my three entries for the Inkscape 0.45 About dialog box contest over on deviantArt (which I posted about a short time ago). You can check out my three entries right here. You'll notice that my new blog header image is similar in concept to my third deviantArt entry.
Inkscape 0.45 (which is about to be released shortly) has a new blur feature which I've put to use here in moving those small tiddlywinks to the background. I've gone away from the shiny floor reflection since it's oh so 2006. (psst - actually I still like that effect but don't go telling anyone).
Anyways, I toyed with the thought of revamping the look of the blog completely for the start of the new year, but actually decided I still quite like the blue background. I will however make it my mission to update my blogroll and add my Flickr zeitgeist widget over on the right when I have time.
Let me know what you think.
Thursday, December 28, 2006
My Christmas Battle 2006
Sitting here nimbly typing away, I notice my fingers slightly trembling. I've developed a subtle but unmistakable throbbing in the back of my head, just above the nape of my neck. I'm also noticing a discrete nerve causing an intermittent twitch under my left eye.
Too much Christmas cider? Nah, can't stand the stuff. Too much coffee? Nah, can never get enough.
What I am describing is much more hideous than that. It is the result of the parent-hating, sadist who thought up the idea of the 15,000 piece bead kit (and my in-laws who decided to buy it for my daughter).
Sure, it looks like a great idea. Heck, I'm no crafty crafter, but some beads and string matched up with an almost 5 year old seems like a safe bet... Just don't try to unpack it.
The box it came in has a nice clear front panel that displays all 15,000 beads (it might as well be 150,000,000) in neat little compartmentalized cavities. My in-laws had the awesome idea of giving us a small plastic Rubbermaid-type 4-drawer cabinet along with it to keep little one organized.
The transfer of beads from original package to 4-drawer plasti-chest proves my undoing. Of course the large bead thingys are a piece of cake. Being the engineer I am, I sat and scratched my chin for a moment before getting a small teaspoon to aid in the material transfer operation. Making great strides with the compartments containing larger beads, I thought pretty highly of myself.
Did you know that they can make beads that are almost microscopic in size? Did you know that square shaped compartments made of thin vacuum formed plastic can act as minature trampoline-like launchpads for said tiny beads?
With every slight snap of the oil-canning compartment bottoms (think the bottom of the classic Trouble board game's pop-o-matic bubble), came the shower of untold hundreds of micro-beads. With every dip of the spoon, every surgically gentle extraction attempt, came flying micro beads.
Every flying bead took with it a shred of my dignity and a whole whack of my patience.
Ninety minutes later, the transfer is done (unbeknownst to my daughter, at least 200 micro-beads remained in the package and were headed for the trash) and we are stringing beads.
One final humiliating realization came to me while trying to thread some of the smaller beads. Daddy needs glasses.
Grrrr.
Too much Christmas cider? Nah, can't stand the stuff. Too much coffee? Nah, can never get enough.
What I am describing is much more hideous than that. It is the result of the parent-hating, sadist who thought up the idea of the 15,000 piece bead kit (and my in-laws who decided to buy it for my daughter).
Sure, it looks like a great idea. Heck, I'm no crafty crafter, but some beads and string matched up with an almost 5 year old seems like a safe bet... Just don't try to unpack it.
The box it came in has a nice clear front panel that displays all 15,000 beads (it might as well be 150,000,000) in neat little compartmentalized cavities. My in-laws had the awesome idea of giving us a small plastic Rubbermaid-type 4-drawer cabinet along with it to keep little one organized.
The transfer of beads from original package to 4-drawer plasti-chest proves my undoing. Of course the large bead thingys are a piece of cake. Being the engineer I am, I sat and scratched my chin for a moment before getting a small teaspoon to aid in the material transfer operation. Making great strides with the compartments containing larger beads, I thought pretty highly of myself.
Did you know that they can make beads that are almost microscopic in size? Did you know that square shaped compartments made of thin vacuum formed plastic can act as minature trampoline-like launchpads for said tiny beads?
With every slight snap of the oil-canning compartment bottoms (think the bottom of the classic Trouble board game's pop-o-matic bubble), came the shower of untold hundreds of micro-beads. With every dip of the spoon, every surgically gentle extraction attempt, came flying micro beads.
Every flying bead took with it a shred of my dignity and a whole whack of my patience.
Ninety minutes later, the transfer is done (unbeknownst to my daughter, at least 200 micro-beads remained in the package and were headed for the trash) and we are stringing beads.
One final humiliating realization came to me while trying to thread some of the smaller beads. Daddy needs glasses.
Grrrr.
Okay... then why?
Robert Scoble writes:
Sorry if this is a stupid question Robert, but why exactly did they invite you along then? Maybe I'm missing the point.
[Edit: Maybe for ScobleShow video coverage?]
"But, I’m not going to write a lot about John Edwards."
Sorry if this is a stupid question Robert, but why exactly did they invite you along then? Maybe I'm missing the point.
[Edit: Maybe for ScobleShow video coverage?]
Tuesday, December 26, 2006
It's Over... or at least partially...
Hopefully everyone enjoyed (or is still enjoying) their holiday time. Myself, I feel kinda relieved it's over once again for another year. It's such a mad rush at the end of the year. As you can see from the photo above, our dog Jessie was as beat as we were by the end of it all.
It's not completely over since our little one has her birthday a couple of days from now and New Years is just next weekend. If holidays are supposed to be restful, then these don't qualify as holidays.
Among the nice shirts, belts and ties, I snagged a nice gift certificate to a local camera store. Right now it's a toss-up between a new lens and a new printer. I've been pining for the Epson R800 printer for over a year now, but the price never seems to drop ($449-499 CDN). I feel guilty for paying that much for an inkjet, although I have seen the output and it is quite nice.
So it may be that I'm leaning towards a Canon 85mm f1.8 lens. It's a little more than the printer, but it's fast and relatively cheap. On my 350D it will work like a 135mm lens and since I love available light photography (witness most of my nicer photographs) that nice wide aperture is very very appealing. So we'll see in a few days if I change my mind.
For now, my absolute favourite shooting is done with the 50mm f1.8 cheapy that I bought a while back. While you still have to fight with moving subjects under typical indoor lighting, sleeping dogs turn out rather well. :)
Friday, December 22, 2006
Freefall... positively...
Talk about a positive outlook. Here's an extremely entertaining and well-written guide to surviving a 35,000 ft freefall. If you do manage to exit the aircraft at 600mph, at least you can be prepared. Here's a small excerpt of the greatness that is this article:
At least somebody is thinking ahead. ;)
Snow is good—soft, deep, drifted snow. Snow is lovely. Remember that you are the pilot and your body is the aircraft. By tilting forward and putting your hands at your side, you can modify your pitch and make progress not just vertically but horizontally as well. As you go down 15,000 feet, you can also go sideways two-thirds of that distance—that's two miles! Choose your landing zone. You be the boss.
At least somebody is thinking ahead. ;)
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
Bubbling Up
Ahh the holidays. When you couple the Christmas, New Year (and in our case birthday) season hurtling towards you with a ridiculous amount of work as every Tom, Dick and Sally comes out of the woodwork wanting projects finished and permit applications submitted before the new year, you end up with time for little else.
It's truly amazing how life can get so busy that you simply have little time to ponder anything at all (and that includes potential blogging topics). You forget how valuable those (these) spare moments are to your sanity.
A couple of things that *have* managed to bubble up:
The next version of Inkscape, 0.45, is upcoming. The Inkscapers group on Deviantart is soliciting entries for the "About Inkscape" dialog box. I managed to create a DeviantArt account (a long time fan of the site, but never a member, until now) and posted a couple of entries. Lots of very talented and creative people there, so I'm not sure I stand any chance although as of yet, there are not many entries. What the heck though, worth a shot.
My daughter has taken a real shine to TuxPaint as of late. While the resulting canvases (sp?) will likely only win rave reviews from Daddy and Mommy, it has done absolute wonders for her mousing and keyboard skills in a very short time. Don't be fooled by its overly simplistic look (this is not a Disney creation). It struck just the right balance between providing fun painting tools with good sound feedback and appropriately sized buttons and controls. Although typically thought of as a Linux app, it is available for both Windows and OSX as well.
Finally a quick note or two just to piss off those people who always harp and complain about political correctness during the holidays.
1. Happy Holidays, Seasons Greetings and [insert other generic holiday term wishing well to people of all faiths from the athiest to the agnostic to the devoutly spiritual]. Why should we be ashamed for wanting to include all people in our best wishes? Get over it.
2. My daughter is learning about a multitude of cultural and religious celebrations at school right now. She brought home a little craft that outlined the meaning of Kwanzaa. Ahh Kwanzaa, I used to laugh at that - in some way, the butt of jokes. The principles of Kwanzaa outlined on that little craft sounded more profound and reasoned to me than anything I'd gotten out of Christmas celebrations in the past.
See, even an almost-five year old can expand your horizons.
Shopping is done. Presents are bought. Two more days of the daily grind until we coast to Christmas. It couldn't come at a better time.
It's truly amazing how life can get so busy that you simply have little time to ponder anything at all (and that includes potential blogging topics). You forget how valuable those (these) spare moments are to your sanity.
A couple of things that *have* managed to bubble up:
The next version of Inkscape, 0.45, is upcoming. The Inkscapers group on Deviantart is soliciting entries for the "About Inkscape" dialog box. I managed to create a DeviantArt account (a long time fan of the site, but never a member, until now) and posted a couple of entries. Lots of very talented and creative people there, so I'm not sure I stand any chance although as of yet, there are not many entries. What the heck though, worth a shot.
My daughter has taken a real shine to TuxPaint as of late. While the resulting canvases (sp?) will likely only win rave reviews from Daddy and Mommy, it has done absolute wonders for her mousing and keyboard skills in a very short time. Don't be fooled by its overly simplistic look (this is not a Disney creation). It struck just the right balance between providing fun painting tools with good sound feedback and appropriately sized buttons and controls. Although typically thought of as a Linux app, it is available for both Windows and OSX as well.
Finally a quick note or two just to piss off those people who always harp and complain about political correctness during the holidays.
1. Happy Holidays, Seasons Greetings and [insert other generic holiday term wishing well to people of all faiths from the athiest to the agnostic to the devoutly spiritual]. Why should we be ashamed for wanting to include all people in our best wishes? Get over it.
2. My daughter is learning about a multitude of cultural and religious celebrations at school right now. She brought home a little craft that outlined the meaning of Kwanzaa. Ahh Kwanzaa, I used to laugh at that - in some way, the butt of jokes. The principles of Kwanzaa outlined on that little craft sounded more profound and reasoned to me than anything I'd gotten out of Christmas celebrations in the past.
See, even an almost-five year old can expand your horizons.
Shopping is done. Presents are bought. Two more days of the daily grind until we coast to Christmas. It couldn't come at a better time.
Friday, December 15, 2006
Some good news in the news for a change
I think we've all become somewhat used to hearing about medical progress in terms of identifying problems, treatments to mitigate symptoms or preventative measures. Not every day you read about the reversal of a disease.
Of course it's not quite "there" yet, but "Canadian scientists reverse diabetes in mice".
Some good news in the news for a change.
Of course it's not quite "there" yet, but "Canadian scientists reverse diabetes in mice".
Some good news in the news for a change.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Early Gift From Flickr!
Looks like Flickr has given an early Christmas present to its users! Free account holders get their upload limits increased 5X to 100MB/month! And even better still Pro account holders (of which I am one) now get unlimited uploads!
Now I've really got to get my arse in gear. I've yet to run up against the old 2GB/month limit. Sounds like I'm not taking or uploading nearly enough photos. ;)
Now I've really got to get my arse in gear. I've yet to run up against the old 2GB/month limit. Sounds like I'm not taking or uploading nearly enough photos. ;)
Ho Ho Holiday Flickr Fun with Photos
Lifehacker has a post up about a neat little Flickr easter egg which lets you put a Santa hat or beard on a photo.
But why do that when you can do the real thing! Here's a shot of my lovely niece Sarah from this past weekend:
But why do that when you can do the real thing! Here's a shot of my lovely niece Sarah from this past weekend:
Tuesday, December 12, 2006
Somebody set me straight on Hip-hop for 5 year olds
1. Breakfast done, Dad flips it to The Learning Channel and then heads to the kitchen to ready the school lunch for his almost-five year old daughter.
2. Dad overhears the backbeat of hip-hop music and some rapping.
3. Peeking into the living room, it's Hip Hop Harry. He's rappin' the benefits of sharing, playing fair and staying fit.
4. It's kinda like Barney, only instead of being annoyingly sanitized and corny, he's leading a breakdance competition to end the show.. oh yeah, and he's a bear wearing a big medallion, not a purple dinosaur.
5. In the show-ending dance off, each kid takes a turn in the circle, body-popping, spinning around - y'know all the moves, but everyone - even the girls- are dancing with a very serious, almost grimace on their faces. It's like they're saying 'yeah, that's right.. I'm a bad mofo..'.
6. Tonight, almost-five year old is quietly singing/rapping, 'Go Harry..Go Harry..Go Harry..'
Ok. I'm torn. I'm not supposed to pre-judge. I told myself I'd always be open to new things. But in my head I'm thinking, "Hip-hop aimed at 3 to 6 year olds????"
I know that listening to hip-hop doesn't turn you into a street hood. Even I like listening to it sometimes. But can you honestly tell me it wasn't borne out of that culture? Why are so many hip-hop videos about SUV ridin' maniacs tearin' down da house?
Yo yo yo... I don't have a problem with the hip-hop. It can be da bomb so to speak. But 3 to 6 year olds?? C'mon. Would there be a complaint if a show was created with goth-type characters to the backbeat of something like Marilyn Manson (does that even have a backbeat?) ?
Am I simply a confused middle-aged Canadian father whose falling into the conservative trappings of so many before him? I don't have a problem discussing the state of death metal with my 17 year old nephew. Why am I so confused with this?
Somebody please set me straight.
2. Dad overhears the backbeat of hip-hop music and some rapping.
3. Peeking into the living room, it's Hip Hop Harry. He's rappin' the benefits of sharing, playing fair and staying fit.
4. It's kinda like Barney, only instead of being annoyingly sanitized and corny, he's leading a breakdance competition to end the show.. oh yeah, and he's a bear wearing a big medallion, not a purple dinosaur.
5. In the show-ending dance off, each kid takes a turn in the circle, body-popping, spinning around - y'know all the moves, but everyone - even the girls- are dancing with a very serious, almost grimace on their faces. It's like they're saying 'yeah, that's right.. I'm a bad mofo..'.
6. Tonight, almost-five year old is quietly singing/rapping, 'Go Harry..Go Harry..Go Harry..'
Ok. I'm torn. I'm not supposed to pre-judge. I told myself I'd always be open to new things. But in my head I'm thinking, "Hip-hop aimed at 3 to 6 year olds????"
I know that listening to hip-hop doesn't turn you into a street hood. Even I like listening to it sometimes. But can you honestly tell me it wasn't borne out of that culture? Why are so many hip-hop videos about SUV ridin' maniacs tearin' down da house?
Yo yo yo... I don't have a problem with the hip-hop. It can be da bomb so to speak. But 3 to 6 year olds?? C'mon. Would there be a complaint if a show was created with goth-type characters to the backbeat of something like Marilyn Manson (does that even have a backbeat?) ?
Am I simply a confused middle-aged Canadian father whose falling into the conservative trappings of so many before him? I don't have a problem discussing the state of death metal with my 17 year old nephew. Why am I so confused with this?
Somebody please set me straight.
Short Answers and the Fall of Civilization
Here's the email I send to a client asking for confirmation on a couple of items (of course the names and subject matter have been changed to protect the innocent... and me):
No fine work of literature to be sure. But it was simple and clear enough don't you think? Here's the response (via frickin' Blackberry of course)
So is that a yes only on the jibberjabs, blickity blocks and pinky-doo? What am I to assume for the second part of the question?
Is this a result of PDA/SMS/Blackberry short cryptic notation syndrome? Where is the art of communication going? I read plenty of emails a day. You would think the proliferation of written communication would yield some improvement, but all it's done is laid the problem bare for more to see.
I know, I know. Another grammar rant. But there wasn't even a period on the end of that single word reply! But at least it was spelled correctly.
I must be going a little batty, because I actually enjoy reading the odd email that comes to me with full punctuation, correct spelling and some semblance of coherence and planning. It happens once or twice every couple of weeks (I swear - no more frequent than that). You have to enjoy them when you can.
Apologies for liberating the curmudgeon in me again. But somebody has to document the fall of civilization. Why not me? ;)
Hi Zanzibar,
So it is full height jibberjabs and blickity blocks with a continuous 12x9 pinky-doo everywhere? Are blingitybings or additional rinkydinks required?
Thanks,
Richard Querin, P.Eng.
No fine work of literature to be sure. But it was simple and clear enough don't you think? Here's the response (via frickin' Blackberry of course)
Yes
So is that a yes only on the jibberjabs, blickity blocks and pinky-doo? What am I to assume for the second part of the question?
Is this a result of PDA/SMS/Blackberry short cryptic notation syndrome? Where is the art of communication going? I read plenty of emails a day. You would think the proliferation of written communication would yield some improvement, but all it's done is laid the problem bare for more to see.
I know, I know. Another grammar rant. But there wasn't even a period on the end of that single word reply! But at least it was spelled correctly.
I must be going a little batty, because I actually enjoy reading the odd email that comes to me with full punctuation, correct spelling and some semblance of coherence and planning. It happens once or twice every couple of weeks (I swear - no more frequent than that). You have to enjoy them when you can.
Apologies for liberating the curmudgeon in me again. But somebody has to document the fall of civilization. Why not me? ;)
Monday, December 11, 2006
Photos and Inkscape
[click here to see a higher resolution version on Flickr]
A quick note to the Inkscape mailing list today gave me a couple of quick ways to trim imported bitmaps to the shape of any arbitrary boundary:
1. Select both objects and then choose Object->Clip->Set
or
2. Create a pattern fill based on a bitmap using Object->Pattern->Objects To Pattern, and then fill the object with that pattern.
This proved to be quite fun, so I put together the little collage you see above. It was probably easier to create this in Inkscape than in a bitmap editor like GIMP or Photoshop since you could easily create, rotate and modify each 'snapshot' throughout the process and modify gradients etc..
You can do quite a few neat things with a bitmap photo imported into a vector based editor like Inkscape. There are a few neat demo video's over on the Xara site. One of them shows some interesting things about photo editing on a vector graphics editor. Good stuff.
Saturday, December 09, 2006
Inkscape Screencast 2 - A Quicky Glass Globe
Did you know that if you take a strip of masking tape, one cheapy Dell stick microphone (which came with some of our old systems at work) combined with my mini camera tripod, a creatively bent coat hanger and one of my daughter's nylons for a wind/breath screen, you can actually record a screencast with narration? Hah!
It took about 4 takes before I was even remotely satisfied that it was audible enough. The sound seemed so low and hissy at first. Still, it's not the greatest - and of course YouTube has simply butchered the video quality, but it might be useful to some.
In this screencast I create a quicky glass globe. Now, as I've mentioned ad nauseum, I'm no Inkscape expert or graphic designer. If you've got Inkscape tips or some other constructive criticism, please, let's hear it!
It took about 4 takes before I was even remotely satisfied that it was audible enough. The sound seemed so low and hissy at first. Still, it's not the greatest - and of course YouTube has simply butchered the video quality, but it might be useful to some.
In this screencast I create a quicky glass globe. Now, as I've mentioned ad nauseum, I'm no Inkscape expert or graphic designer. If you've got Inkscape tips or some other constructive criticism, please, let's hear it!
Friday, December 08, 2006
Inkscape Screencast - My First Experiment
A few posts ago I gave a few quick examples of shiny web2.0-like objects I created in Inkscape. Before I posted that I actually did a little half-hour attempt at a screencast with a program called Xvidcap. It failed miserably, generating a tiny video at about 2 frames per second. Not Good.
Will Simpson commented on that post that he'd like to see a screencast of some Inkscape stuff, so I took a little more time to investigate. With the exception of having to modify the first line of the configure script (changing bin/sh to bin/bash) the instructions in this post worked! So I configured, compiled and built this patched ffmpeg program that let me create a somewhat decent screencast.
The long and short of it? I created a quick screencast showing the creation of a simple black shiny button using Inkscape. Before criticizing it too harshly, read the notes and caveats below.
A few caveats:
Notes:
I converted the avi video from ffmpeg to dv-video for use in Kino. I dubbed in the music with Kino and trimmed it slightly. However I couldn't figure out how to get Kino to export to mpeg4 which supposedly converts best with YouTube so instead I generated an mpeg2 file which may be the main reason for the blurry YouTube quality. I've got to figure this part out better.
The patched ffmpeg program seemed to capture the 800x600 video flawlessly, but when I tried 1024x768, even at lower bitrates, the capturing program would just quit on me. Not sure why. Meh. 800x600 is ok I guess.
Will Simpson commented on that post that he'd like to see a screencast of some Inkscape stuff, so I took a little more time to investigate. With the exception of having to modify the first line of the configure script (changing bin/sh to bin/bash) the instructions in this post worked! So I configured, compiled and built this patched ffmpeg program that let me create a somewhat decent screencast.
The long and short of it? I created a quick screencast showing the creation of a simple black shiny button using Inkscape. Before criticizing it too harshly, read the notes and caveats below.
A few caveats:
- Uploading the video to YouTube significantly degraded the quality (originally 800x600 at 30fps - 1000 kb/s bitrate) - if I find a decent place to host it, you will be able to download a much better version.
- I don't have a microphone to create decent sounding narration so I didn't even attempt it. I may try to pick one up in the next little while.
- Tutorial-type screencasts are kinda (very) useless without narration, so don't expect to learn too much from it - it's really only an experiment.
- To help alleviate 3 minutes of utter boredom I dubbed in a nice Rob Costlow track using Kino - I hope you like some nice solo piano.
Notes:
I converted the avi video from ffmpeg to dv-video for use in Kino. I dubbed in the music with Kino and trimmed it slightly. However I couldn't figure out how to get Kino to export to mpeg4 which supposedly converts best with YouTube so instead I generated an mpeg2 file which may be the main reason for the blurry YouTube quality. I've got to figure this part out better.
The patched ffmpeg program seemed to capture the 800x600 video flawlessly, but when I tried 1024x768, even at lower bitrates, the capturing program would just quit on me. Not sure why. Meh. 800x600 is ok I guess.
Wednesday, December 06, 2006
Christmas Recon Mission - Circa 1981
Talk about your tough love. Makes you wonder why people complain about wasted tax dollars and court resources..
Some of you will hate me for this, but what the hey...
I clearly remember sneaking into my parent's closet on several occasions during mid to late Decembers of years gone by. If the coast was clear, I would look for the presents with my name on them (opening my brother's gifts would clearly be immoral!). Boxes were evaluated not by size, but by heft - a much better indicator of the potential cool-ness of a gift. A quick scan of the taping method and a couple of deft razor blade slices later (my Dad still uses a Wilkinson double-edger by the way) I was in.
Of course I never actually played with the toys. I would open them up just enough to see what they were. After that I was perfectly content to wait until Christmas morning to get them. And I never went through them all. One or two of the heftiest was enough to satisfy me. And it wasn't always smiles and sunshine. It could be Stretch Armstrong, it could be a pair of shoes, you spin the wheel, you takes your chances.
Did it ruin Christmas morning for me? Nah. The excitement was still there. I didn't have to feign the enthusiasm, nor the excitement - only a little bit of surprise. And besides, the greatest parents in the world (my parents - in case you didn't know) weren't idiots and I was no world class cat burglar. I'm sure they knew what I was doing - at least had some clue - because there always seemed to be the one or two "awesome" presents at Christmas that I never ever saw coming.
Would you have called the cops? Heh.
Some of you will hate me for this, but what the hey...
I clearly remember sneaking into my parent's closet on several occasions during mid to late Decembers of years gone by. If the coast was clear, I would look for the presents with my name on them (opening my brother's gifts would clearly be immoral!). Boxes were evaluated not by size, but by heft - a much better indicator of the potential cool-ness of a gift. A quick scan of the taping method and a couple of deft razor blade slices later (my Dad still uses a Wilkinson double-edger by the way) I was in.
Of course I never actually played with the toys. I would open them up just enough to see what they were. After that I was perfectly content to wait until Christmas morning to get them. And I never went through them all. One or two of the heftiest was enough to satisfy me. And it wasn't always smiles and sunshine. It could be Stretch Armstrong, it could be a pair of shoes, you spin the wheel, you takes your chances.
Did it ruin Christmas morning for me? Nah. The excitement was still there. I didn't have to feign the enthusiasm, nor the excitement - only a little bit of surprise. And besides, the greatest parents in the world (my parents - in case you didn't know) weren't idiots and I was no world class cat burglar. I'm sure they knew what I was doing - at least had some clue - because there always seemed to be the one or two "awesome" presents at Christmas that I never ever saw coming.
Would you have called the cops? Heh.
Variations on a Shiny Black Theme
I've noticed a seemingly endless number of "Web 2.0 Shiny Button" tutorials lately. Most of them involving Photoshop. Looking at a couple, it all seems to be about gradients and transparency - something that Inkscape is good at.
I figured I'd take the opportunity to practice my Inkscape chops and play around a bit. So here are some variations on a theme. If you're sick of Web 2.0 with it's shiny, chunky buttons, then take this as your final dose. :)
For anybody interested in playing around with these, you can download the inkscape svg file right here: buttons-fun.svg
First, your typical fat shiny button. Literally 20-30 seconds work in Inkscape.
Next a shiny black and red power button. BTW exactly when did this symbol become synonymous with the power switch anyway?
An over the top version of a vertical scroll control. Either that or a power window switch in your car. This ain't getting any better is it..
Started as a lozenge. Then went for a control button. Ended up with a shiny, buttonless Kensington Trackball.
Is it a remote, or a phone? Not sure. Take away all the buttons and you've got the start of a perfectly good shampoo bottle. Spent about a half-hour on this one. Probably 15 minutes too much. ;)
I figured I'd take the opportunity to practice my Inkscape chops and play around a bit. So here are some variations on a theme. If you're sick of Web 2.0 with it's shiny, chunky buttons, then take this as your final dose. :)
For anybody interested in playing around with these, you can download the inkscape svg file right here: buttons-fun.svg
First, your typical fat shiny button. Literally 20-30 seconds work in Inkscape.
Next a shiny black and red power button. BTW exactly when did this symbol become synonymous with the power switch anyway?
An over the top version of a vertical scroll control. Either that or a power window switch in your car. This ain't getting any better is it..
Started as a lozenge. Then went for a control button. Ended up with a shiny, buttonless Kensington Trackball.
Is it a remote, or a phone? Not sure. Take away all the buttons and you've got the start of a perfectly good shampoo bottle. Spent about a half-hour on this one. Probably 15 minutes too much. ;)
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Lowering the Bar
I have a question. How can someone go to work day in, day out for over 10 years where the primary objective is not to aid progress, not to develop, not to grow, but simply to plod through, exerting only enough enthusiasm to do two things: get paid, and cover your ass. How?
While everyone else both up and down the proverbial totem pole is trying to get to the root of a problem, this person's far too busy eschewing any culpability or fault to contribute to the solution.
Clearly there is no shame in it for him. He casts away blame with such outward vigor that he's clearly proud of it, or ignorant.
The ironic thing is that in most cases this person probably ISN'T the source of the problem, ISN'T to blame, but the act of immediately and vigorously denying any blame does more to hurt his reputation and respect than actually causing the problem.
I've always believed that owning up to mistakes is a necessary part of building reputation, character and respect. But that assumes you care about building those things. If you don't, then happily escaping blame, avoiding responsibility and getting paid is fine I guess.
Ten years on and I still find it hard to believe someone can go through life perfectly happy to wallow, perfectly happy never learning anything and perfectly happy never progressing.
Maybe it's time I lower my expectations of others.
While everyone else both up and down the proverbial totem pole is trying to get to the root of a problem, this person's far too busy eschewing any culpability or fault to contribute to the solution.
Clearly there is no shame in it for him. He casts away blame with such outward vigor that he's clearly proud of it, or ignorant.
The ironic thing is that in most cases this person probably ISN'T the source of the problem, ISN'T to blame, but the act of immediately and vigorously denying any blame does more to hurt his reputation and respect than actually causing the problem.
I've always believed that owning up to mistakes is a necessary part of building reputation, character and respect. But that assumes you care about building those things. If you don't, then happily escaping blame, avoiding responsibility and getting paid is fine I guess.
Ten years on and I still find it hard to believe someone can go through life perfectly happy to wallow, perfectly happy never learning anything and perfectly happy never progressing.
Maybe it's time I lower my expectations of others.
Sunday, December 03, 2006
Will Wright on Colbert this Monday night
In case you hadn't heard or read:
Will Wright is going to be on the Colbert Report tomorrow (Monday) night.
Wright is the designer of such awesome games as SimCity, TheSims, and the upcoming Spore game.
I love his games simply because they make you think, make you work, and illustrate how great computer games don't have to be about burning down Santa Monica Blvd or (the Streets of Baghdad) with guns 'ablazin.
Will Wright is going to be on the Colbert Report tomorrow (Monday) night.
Wright is the designer of such awesome games as SimCity, TheSims, and the upcoming Spore game.
I love his games simply because they make you think, make you work, and illustrate how great computer games don't have to be about burning down Santa Monica Blvd or (the Streets of Baghdad) with guns 'ablazin.
Video editing on Linux - Any Recommendations?
Back in August of 05, just as a test I posted this short video clip on my family blog. I think it illustrates how effectively a well chosen bit of music can enhance just about anything (slideshow, video or otherwise). I haven't done a heck of a lot of video editing since then (just too many other pursuits I guess). I've shot video clips off and on, but they've yet to make it from the mini-dv tape to the pc in the last year. The clip you see above was created using (gasp!) Windows Movie Maker. The music is by the awesomely talented Rob Costlow.
But I'm hearing and reading more and more about video editing on Linux lately. I've tried out Kino once or twice and while it seemed a little alien to me, I'm sure with a little patience and a little effort I could nibble into the stack of DV tapes on my desk that just sits there collecting dust.
Right now I've read or heard about Kino, Diva, Cinelerra, QDvdAuthor, ManDVD, and KDEnlive.
Have you edited video on Linux? What have you used? Any recommendations?
Note: Apologies for the poor quality of the youtube clip. I only had the video in wmv format (which supposedly doesn't convert so well to flash I guess) and I didn't have time - and didn't know how to convert it to mpeg4 or divx which is supposed to work better. If anybody's got tips on that, please let me know.
Working Tablet + GIMP = :)
Back about a week ago, I posted about the trouble I was having getting my Wacom tablet to work correctly with the GIMP. It wasn't moving over the full extents of the screen, and it wasn't getting recognized as an extended input device in the GIMP (which lets you use pressure-sensitivity).
As you can see by the image above, I now have it working. But I almost forgot to post about getting it to work. Thanks to Donncha for sending me a comment on that previous post which reminded me. BTW there are some awesome photos on Donncha's blog, you should check them out.
So here's the story. I cleaned up my xorg.conf file so that any references to serial or tablet-pc based entries in the wacom sections of the file were deleted. I also uninstalled and reinstalled the wacom-tools package as well.
But I'm not sure which (if any) of those things were the problem. My other problem was (and is) is that restarting X after each modification didn't seem to work properly. Normally (for the Ubuntu distro anyway) you hit Ctrl-Backspace to restart X. On my machine, this logs me out, returns me to the GDM login prompt as expected. But on re-logging in, it can never get back to the desktop. I end up stuck at a light blue screen with full mouse movement but no desktop to speak of. The only option left is to reboot.
So being the newbie that I am, I was making changes to my xorg.conf file and then logging out and logging back in. Apparently, this does NOT restart the Xserver which means any of the changes I had made were not 'taking'.
The long and short of it is that I cleaned up the xorg.conf file, reinstalled the wacom-tools package and then the next morning when I started up the machine, the tablet was working fine. The Gimp recognized it and full pressure sensitivity was enabled.
Sorry there was no magical answer here. But I can say that there are several good threads on getting tablet devices to work. If you want to see what my current xorg.conf file looks like, I posted it right here in a message thread on ubuntuforums.org. It seems to work flawlessly for me right now so check it out if you're having problems.
Note: I have a Wacom Graphire3 tablet, a miniature notebook sized MS mouse (for my daughter), and a normal sized mouse, all of which are USB( and all of which are always hooked up and all of which seem to work perfectly now). I'm running Ubuntu Edgy with Beryl installed. If you have a serial model or are using a different distribution or setup your mileage may vary.
Friday, December 01, 2006
OLPC - Why Criticize? And the "Evils" of Computers and Kids
There is some discussion and criticism going on about the One Laptop Per Child program. And while if there's one thing blogs are good for, it's criticism. But you have to wonder sometimes how people rationalize their arguments.
Sure, providing a cheap laptop is not as high a priority as sanitary drinking water and food. No brain surgery degree required there. But what point is there to shooting down a perfectly good idea and project? Does providing a computing tool to people who would otherwise never have it necessarily preclude the work being done by humanitarian agencies to provide safe drinking water? Do you think if most of these people weren't developing the OLPC they'd be doing anything at all? Take what you can get brother! At this stage should we really be waiting for the one and only 'perfect' solution and shooting down every other attempt from some other direction? Can we really afford to do that? Let people contribute in any way they want to contribute. Be glad their doing anything at all.
And then in one of the comments on Jeff Jarvis' blog I read this snippet:
What makes using the computer (and Internet) as a research tool any different than the once high and mighty intellectual trip to the local library? You search, you read, you consume. Because it's easier, is it somehow less valuable? Since when does reading and learning about things NOT count towards life development? Do you think real life experiences are somehow diminished with the advent of computers? Is one taking time from the other? Or is one able to enhance and complement the other?
Computers are what you make of them. I don't discount the value of trips to the beach (or knitting - actually I was a decent knitter at about 5 yrs of age - don't tell my friends). But I don't think they're mutually exclusive things. One can enhance the other. But that's entirely up to the parents. You find the balance.
If you treat it as a babysitter (as many parents do the TV) you've made your own bed. If you treat it as a tool that makes learning more things more easily, then I feel it can be tremendously valuable. Does it make kids less socially interactive? Does it make them antisocial? Is it a threat to the development of children? Only if parents let it.
I'm of the ilk that thinks too many parents are willing to place the responsibility (or blame) for all these things elsewhere. Anywhere but on themselves. If it's not the school system it's the Internet, or computers or the state of television broadcast standards or something else. Parent's need to realize that THEY are the ones who go furthest in determining how their children grow up.
One look at the throngs of kids hanging out at the malls all day leads me to believe I'm in the minority with that view.
Sure, providing a cheap laptop is not as high a priority as sanitary drinking water and food. No brain surgery degree required there. But what point is there to shooting down a perfectly good idea and project? Does providing a computing tool to people who would otherwise never have it necessarily preclude the work being done by humanitarian agencies to provide safe drinking water? Do you think if most of these people weren't developing the OLPC they'd be doing anything at all? Take what you can get brother! At this stage should we really be waiting for the one and only 'perfect' solution and shooting down every other attempt from some other direction? Can we really afford to do that? Let people contribute in any way they want to contribute. Be glad their doing anything at all.
And then in one of the comments on Jeff Jarvis' blog I read this snippet:
Admittedly, I’m a Luddite parent of kids who go to a Waldorf school, where we still believe in sitting quietly and listening to stories. But I really believe– even though I make my living at a computer– that my young kids (2nd grade and preschool) are getting a lot more out of learning to knit (really!), out of playing on the beach in rain or snow, out of being driven to use their imagination and handle the physical world and interact with each other than they would get, or will get for some years, from a box that’s very good at spoonfeeding information and providing reward cues that make you think you’ve gotten a lot more out of it than you really have.Whoa! I'm all for getting out there and experiencing the world, natural and otherwise. But to dismiss the computer simply as a box that's good at spoonfeeding info and providing reward cues that make you overestimate your accomplishments is ridiculous.
What makes using the computer (and Internet) as a research tool any different than the once high and mighty intellectual trip to the local library? You search, you read, you consume. Because it's easier, is it somehow less valuable? Since when does reading and learning about things NOT count towards life development? Do you think real life experiences are somehow diminished with the advent of computers? Is one taking time from the other? Or is one able to enhance and complement the other?
Computers are what you make of them. I don't discount the value of trips to the beach (or knitting - actually I was a decent knitter at about 5 yrs of age - don't tell my friends). But I don't think they're mutually exclusive things. One can enhance the other. But that's entirely up to the parents. You find the balance.
If you treat it as a babysitter (as many parents do the TV) you've made your own bed. If you treat it as a tool that makes learning more things more easily, then I feel it can be tremendously valuable. Does it make kids less socially interactive? Does it make them antisocial? Is it a threat to the development of children? Only if parents let it.
I'm of the ilk that thinks too many parents are willing to place the responsibility (or blame) for all these things elsewhere. Anywhere but on themselves. If it's not the school system it's the Internet, or computers or the state of television broadcast standards or something else. Parent's need to realize that THEY are the ones who go furthest in determining how their children grow up.
One look at the throngs of kids hanging out at the malls all day leads me to believe I'm in the minority with that view.
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