September 2005 Archives
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September 30, 2005
Verizon Settlement over Motorola V710 Bluetooth Class Action Lawsuit
Verizon has a proposed settlement for the class action lawsuit about the Motorola V710 and it's lack of OBEX or File Transfer support. This is good news for consumers, bad news for Verizon and maybe bad news for Motorola. I question who actually has to pay: Motorola because it's their phone or Verizon because it was them (presumably) who made Motorola turn this feature off.
Even more curious is that now the VX9800 supports file transfer -- but still no OBEX!
They have a claim form that can be filled out now. Nothing will happen until the settlement is final, which is supposed to be on January 17, 2006. But you must fill out the (Verizon's PDF) form and have it postmarked by December 9, 2005! Don't forget. You can get a full refund.
In order to be eligible you have to sign, under penalty of perjury that you are the person it was addressed to (uh? it's a web form? is that anyone?), that you bought a V710 before February 2005, and that you believed it would support OBEX or file transfer, and that you own another device that supports OBEX or file transfer or you hand intended to purchase such a device. (Emphasis mine.)
That's relatively loose, really. I certainly hoped that the V710 could have that feature. I never got around to trying any of the firmware leaks that got around as I didn't totally trust them. But I didn't use the phone long and now I have a phone that has file transfer -- from Verizon! (And there were disclaimers everywhere that it didn't support OBEX -- which it doesn't.) I also had a Bluetooth PC Card back then and I have a Bluetooth-enabled PC now. And I purchased the phone the day it shipped -- almost literally. (Just like the VX9800 -- and neither were cheap, nor were they easy to rationalize. But maybe this will get me a refund on the V710 that will cover the VX9800 that has the feature the V710 was missing? Cool. ;) )
So don't forget to mail your claim form in on time!
More information can be found here at Verizon's site.
September 29, 2005
Site Updates and other things...
I've been working on the style sheet and templates lately. MovableType 3.2 has a great new feature for template modules. This allows me to turn all of the little side things and other "modular" items on the web pages into, well, modules. It's much like modular programming. This makes moving things around and general layout much easier.
I also finally finished the templates for the archive pages (individual, category, and date). Those pages should now look much better. Actually, the templates and styling is complete -- but it's far closer than it was before. If it was 30% done before, it's now 80%.
I've also spent a bunch of time on a review of my latest toy: the LG VX9800, a new cell phone on Verizon that features a QWERTY keyboard, bluetooth, a 1.3 megapixel camera, and an MP3 player. You can read my full review here (while enjoying the updated template and styling for the archive page ;) ).
Thanks for stopping by. Now to go relax.. maybe watch some Buffy from Netflix or something.
September 28, 2005
Full Review: The Verizon Communicator (LG VX9800)
(Updated 0ct. 5 9a)
This will also be somewhat of a work in progress. This first pass won't include many pictures -- either of the phone or from it's camera. I would also like to point you over to the pre-release review, which doesn't go into much detail.
I'll go over the basic operation, functionality, and applications that come with the phone. I'll throw in other stuff as I think of them. Let me know if this is useful...
Read the rest of "Full Review: The Verizon Communicator (LG VX9800)"Now in Hand: The Verizon Communicator (aka LG VX9800)
Well, the handset arrived today. I haven't had a whole lot of time to look at it as it came near the end of the work day. I'll be posting up a more complete review -- especially of the changed and now present features -- pretty soon. I may have to skip the pictures, though. It's dark in here and, well, what camera does well in the dark? I guess I'll probably post a couple anyway to show that. ;)
My first impressions are that it's not a preproduction phone anymore. A key is missing and one key changed, too. That was odd. It has file transfer on the BT. Some settings imply it should have DUN, too, but I don't see it available yet -- but I think half of that is me not knowing how to use my desktop software...
The MP3 player is great and works really well. VCast videos are scaled up versions of the ones on other video handsets. That pixelates them some, but they do play full screen on the inside -- they don't play on the outside screen. The MP3 player works both inside and out.
There is a surprising lack of applications available so far. Even less than when the 8940 shipped. I'm sure that will change soon.
Anyway, the rest can wait for a more complete review.
If anyone has any questions, feel free to post them. (I got a comment today, so comments should be working. ;))
Steve Jobs on Full Music Downloads (And My Own Opinions)
This is probably taken a little bit out of context. But the point is there: He's saying he doesn't think people will pay $3 for a full length, 4 minute music file. I think he's wrong. Why? People are currently paying $3-4 for a 15 to 30 second music clip they can assign to as ringer on their handset. They do this even though there are applications out there that allow you to use MMS (often called picture messaging) to send a ringer to your handset for only a quarter.
“I’m not convinced that it will be successful,” he said, observing: “The network providers will charge a lot to download music to a mobile - maybe $3.”
Why do people do this? Why would anyone spend four bucks for 30 seconds of audio? The answer is really rather simple.
To put it simply: convenience. People play around with their phones in line at the grocery store, waiting for a bus, on the bus, waiting at McDonald's, hangin' with their pals at the mall, etc. It's also easy. The money appears on your cell phone bill where it makes maybe a 10% difference if you only buy one a month. You can do the entire transaction on your phone, you don't need cash in your pocket, you don't need a computer around, or anything else. You just whip out your phone and do it.
Now, there is a counter point. And that is simply that the money is already being spent on ringers so there isn't anything left to spend on full audio. Another problem is that many new cell phones come with memory cards where people can load up their current tunes to play. This particular issue goes away if the price becomes a buck or less -- provided you can get rights to that song on your computer.
Now why hasn't Apple already done that with iTunes? They have iTunes for a certain cell phone called the Motorola ROKR (ever hear of that?). The strange thing, though, when I look at the UI is that it looks a whole lot more like the iPod software than the iTunes software. In fact, you can't even purchase music with iTunes for the phone! So what makes it iTunes? Nothing other than Apple wanting to confuse the software names (oh, and so people don't get the idea it's an iPod and think they only need a ROKR and not an iPod -- silly people, you will always need an iPod and a phone that has iPod software that's called iTunes).
iTunes -- on the desktop -- has this particularly important feature of being able to purchase and download content (music, audiobooks, podcasts). If this is iTunes on the phone, how come we can't do that? Purchasing music for the standard prices would be nice. It would be all DRM'd up, like normal, of course. But then it would also allow for the downloading of podcasts and other such things that people often want to listen to while on the run rather than when they're working and need some techno to increase their typing rate. Imagine being able to access your podcast subscriptions from the privacy of your handset. You could do things like get the latest 5 minute NPR news clip -- or catch up on the Daily Source Code. When you're back at your desk and your iTunes Mobile and iTunes Desktop sync up, just like a sync up between an iPod and iTunes Desktop all of your activity, plays, bookmarks, etc will sync up.
And hey, why not sync up your iPod against your iTunes Mobile enabled handset? You purchase songs via iTunes Mobile in a very secure way (debatably more secure than the desktop -- but definitely more private; no one is sniffing your packets at work). Sure, the iPod can store more -- but that's the point. You can offload stuff onto it. This is perfect for kids. Give them a prepaid iTunes Mobile enabled handset with a specific amount of money each month (similar to the quote you can do on iTunes Desktop) and an iPod (probably a full one -- mobile handset storage will surpose Nano's before too long) and all of a sudden they don't need to get in the way of your WoW playing desktop.
And since they have their IM on their cell phone, the desktop login for them can be iTunes and IM free so when it comes to homework time you just grab their iTunes Mobile phone and their iPod and throw them in front of the computer to get their work done.
And that's only one possible use for mobile audio downloads. There are plenty of others. Some I may even keep to myself. ;)
Macworld UK - Apple Expo: Jobs on mobile music and living room PCs
Now Ordered: The LG VX9800
Well, I ordered it yesterday. I hope it comes soon -- we'll see.
Not much else to report just yet. The notification Verizon sent implied the price would go up 50 bucks on Saturday, but it would then be available in stores. Maybe I'll get it a day before then. Heh ;)
Shane Conder's Whateveritis of Nothing: Now Shipping: The LG VX9800!
September 27, 2005
More MegaSound VRCD300-USB Data: Radio Performance
So, due to a strange iTunes goof-up when burning a .m4a file with chapters, I ended up with only about 15 minutes of podcasts coming in to work today. That was boring. So I had to switch over to the radio.
Unfortunately, it would seem that the issues with the radio not working had nothing to do with the solar flares. :(
The stations that are normally strange and static free (88.5 FM on the San Jose side and 90.3 FM on the Santa Cruz side of Hiway 17) are riddled with static, fade outs, and other issues. This is most dissapointing.
I still believe that the head unit is worth the $99 bucks I paid for it. However, I think that's a rationalization, too. Due to issues in installing it in the Jeep and past issues with installing radios in the Miata, we had it professionally installed -- and they (Lott's in Santa Cruz) did a great job; very profiessional -- but that added to the overall cost, too. Not only that, but replacing it is thus costly.
Oh well. It's working pretty well for podcast CDs. I can either use normal CD burning software to burn an MP3 CD-RW that works great or use iTunes to burn an audio CD-RW that also works great. One of these days I'll get around to trying to get support for the USB key issues. There may be some simple trick to it.
I should also make sure the antenna was hooked up the radio properly. For some reason, the head unit only gets power when the car is on -- not when the accessories are on.
Another issue with the MegaSound VRCD300-USB I have is that it has to be on for the eject button to work. That's annoying. Our other unit allows for eject even with the key out of the ignition.
Shane Conder's Whateveritis of Nothing: MegaSound VRCD300-USB Update -- Again
Now Shipping: The LG VX9800!
Yes, it's finally shipping! Given some of the disclaimers on the site, it does look like some features I saw have been turned off -- or something. I'll have to get one to see for sure.
About getting one... apparently, it's online only. At least for now. It's got a price of $299 with a $50 online discount with a new, 2 year contract or $399 for one year or $469 with no contract. I have to figure out if I can get the "new every two" $100 bucks off of it, too. And I'll have to decide if I should sell off a VX7000, a V710, or the 8940... (and perhaps some other phones ... and maybe an arm, to finish off paying for it).
Well, it's a bit more expensive than I think it should be. However, it does come in at the same price that the V710 come in at when it first launched, so it's not all bad. But I'm not going to wait over a year to be able to pay a hundred bucks for it...
If anyone picks one up, let me know what you think! I will post a more complete review when I can. I might even try to find all the undocumented bits. ;)
September 26, 2005
September 25, 2005
Done Upgrading to MT 3.2 (and quick mini review)
Alright, that was much more painless than I had anticipated. The change in configuration files really only meant that the database password setting was in the configuration file. The rest of it was not only the same basic settings, but in the same basic format and in a different file name. No issues there.
A couple of directories had been removed -- so I removed those from the server. The images directory, as well as a couple of files, are now in an mt-static directory. This wasn't documented, but I quickly saw that this was a problem when I loaded up the management site and the styles weren't there. So I removed the old files and uploaded the new ones where they were supposed to be. (The instructions had said to overwrite files, so I thought maybe they were just in their own directory because they are special and have their own path setting... not so.)
I like the new configuration abilities. Plugins can be configured both at the system-wide level and blog level. Entries, comments, and whatnot can all be viewed aggregated across all blogs or just one blog. Basically, a whole bunch of system-wide settings and listings has been added on top.
The whole management system has been upgraded with a better look and more modern scripts and HTML pieces (think Hotmail vs Gmail in their current incarnations). The new look and feel is much better, while still being very much the same old MT that we all like.
I haven't let it touch my templates yet and it hasn't broken them yet. I'll probably just continue with my own templates, since they seem to work fine, and just look at the new ones to see if I'm missing anything cool. My own were redesigned to make stylesheet management easier. They aren't perfect yet, but they are known to me rather than having to learn the new templates then apply my look to those.
Upgrading to MovableType 3.2
So, I'm about to upgrade to the latest version of MovableType. Normally I upgrade quickly, but this latest one is a rather large change and it's extensive upgrade instructions have made be nervous. Older upgrades were of the "upload all of this, but not this, then run this upgrade script" variety -- and they all worked fine without goofing anything up. This time around, it's "migrate these settings, make sure you remove these plugins, do this and that, then start uploading files."
Makes me nervous.
It also makes me feel a little overwhelmed. I've got a fairly modified set of templates and MT 3.2 has a whole new way of handling them, or a bunch of new features, or something... it's not entirely clear. I like having the latest stuff running, but at what cost?
I was just about to sit down and fix up some of the templates when I decided that it would be better to do that _after_ upgrading to 3.2 in case I had to start over. Coming to those sort of decisions isn't always a good thing.
Well, we'll see how it goes... this is the last post on a pre-3.2 install. (Unless it totally fails and I have to restore from my backup, of course.)
September 23, 2005
Verizon Details the LG VX9800!
Well, it's official: Verizon has information on the LG VX9800 on their website! You can read my mini-review of it here. No mention of price yet, but rumor has it to be closer in cost to phones like the VX8100 than the Palm Treo. And that's a good thing!
(The image link goes to Verizon's "demo" of the LG VX9800 which shows the basica functionality.)
The 12MB memory seems a little low compare to what I was seeing. We'll just have to wait and see what the final version looks and feels like, huh?
September 18, 2005
San Juan: The Card Game for Puerto Rico
I don't write about games all that much, but I play them frequently. Lately, I've been playing more frequently than normal. Additionally, I've been more into looking at what games are out there. I'm not referring to video games, either. For that, I've most just been playing some Xbox games (Pirates!, Dark Alliance (yeah, it's old, but it's co-op), and such) and PC games (Neverwinter Nights).
Tonight, I just got back from playing San Juan for the first time. It's basically a port of Puerto Rico from a board game to a card game. I really enjoyed playing it (and this had little to do with the fact that I won two out of three of the games).
It's published by Rio Grande Games (Puerto Rico, Carcassonne, Niagara, Medici, and dozens of other games) and designed by Andreas Seyfarth (Puerto Rico, Zorro, Manhattan, and some others). Being a card game, there isn't much in the box. It contains a deck of cards, some role pieces, and a few resource price pieces. In addition, it comes with a pencil and a score pad that is a nice addition, although not required for play.
The cards are everything. They are buildings you can build, money you can spend (1 card per cost), and the resources you build. This replaces many different items in the full board game. There are two types of buildings: production buildings and the so-called "violet" buildings that either give special abilities or extra victory points.
The goal is to have the most victory points at the end of the game. The game ends when the first person reaches 12 buildings. Usually buildings are built every round and you start with one which means the game is often as short as 11 rounds.
We found the game went quicker each of the three plays. Also, curiously, both the highest and lowest scores kept going down each game.
We all found "The Library" card to be very powerful and useful for us. We normally followed fairly similar strategies, where possible. You can't always do exactly what you want to, though, because there are a limited number of each type of card and it's possible to keep cards out of other peoples hands if you really want to.
So, overall, I really enjoyed playing the game and I'm going to try to figure out how Laurie and I can get it soon as it's a 2-4 person game -- and small to carry around.
Additional reviews can be found over at BoardGameGeek as well as reviews of the other games I mentioned.
September 17, 2005
Phishing for Trouble
Phishing is far worse than spam. Spam is easy to identify and filter. Phishing, on the other hand, often looks exactly like an email from some company you know. The most common ones I get are ebay and paypal ones. I also get a splattering of bank ones, some even from banks I don't have accounts for.
The worst kind, though, are the ones that announce a new product or service at a new URL and explain that it's OK to login at this new URL because it's a new service. Brilliant. I have to wonder just how many people get hung up on that type.
This is also sharply eating into my trust of receiving statements or statement notices via email. I'll never click on the links in them -- not anymore, at least. Even if they do list the "last 4" of your account, there are only 10,000 possibilities there, so it could be wrong. Given a phishing email of say, 10,000,000 recipients the odds are if they use a single 4-digit number it'll match at least 1,000 of the recipients, assuming an even distribution.
So what is to be done about this problem? First, you have to learn how to recognize them. Typically this means checking the headers and seeing if there are any strange domains in them. This, of course, is easiest for techinicaly people -- others will see all domains as strange and the format of the headers daunting.
Second, you have to report them. Every single one of them. Yes, even duplicates. Each time I receive one, I forward a copy of it and an attachment of it to the apppropriate email address (spoof@ebay.com, spoof@paypal.com, phishing@..., etc). I then delete them. I usually get responses say either they are looking into it and yes, it really was a spoof.
So, the way I figure it, if everyone sent a report in the company would have to increase the resources spent on responding to them. This would also mean increasing technology to prevent them from being so successful and lobbying for laws to make the penalties harsh (much harsher than spam).
See, taking the example above of 10,000,000 mailings out daily we can make a difference. If every single person on the list forwarded a copy of the phishing email to the company, they would have to process each one and send out an email. Take a typical phising email of 20 kilobytes. That means the spammer is sending out 190 gigabytes a day. Assuming a response email of 15 kilobytes from the company, they would have to be able to handle 9.9 terabytes of transfer each month. That sort of bandwidth doesn't come cheap.
Thing is, I usually get 4-5 phishing emails a day from multiple different sources. The numbers above could easily be 10-100x what I've estimated. The phishers are using a tremendous amount of bandwidth. And since bandwidth like that doesn't come free, they must be making money somehow.
Of course, making money that way is completely illegal, as opposed to selling a product through spam which is legal. So these guys already do fall under other laws, which is great. However, it's clearly not enough.
If ebay had to deal with 100 million phishing report emails everyday, do you think they would do anything about it? What about a small bank? This sort of attention could bring down a small company.
Anyway, just my thoughts. It wouldn't be possible to have every phishing email result in a report, especially since certain types of spam catchers will easily detect them. For instance, gmail can detect phishing emails easily -- and reports them as such, even if they don't go into the spam folder.
The LG VX9800: Data Finally at Phonescoop (& Review)
Well, I meant to post about this earlier in the week. I get a lot of search hits for information on the VX9800 -- and even emails. Now there at least is a place for some of the details of the phone. The pictures show the keyboard, of course, and the miniSD card slot.
I'd guess that the 9800 will provide MP3 playback from the miniSD card slot in the same way that the LG VX8100 does. That is, after you've flashed the LG VX8100 -- hopefully this won't be needed on the VX9800.
The keyboard is easy to use as a thumbboard or two finger hunt'n'peck while it's on a firm surface. I almost always use it as a thumbboard. However, it is no where near as easy to use as the original Blackberry keyboard (the pager sized Blackberry from 5 or so years ago). The keys actually take a fair amount of pressure to push, which slows things down some and tends to tire out my thumbs (maybe I'm just not gaming as much as I should be -- hrm). The symbol and caps lock keys work great: they are toggle keys. The only downside is that there isn't any indicator if they are activated or not. If you're not typing text but trying to hit a number key to activate a menu item, you may find yourself hitting it a couple of times before you realize you're still in symbol mode.
The sofy keys are absolutely a pain to hit when the device is open part way, like you'll see in the phonescoop picture. It can open completely flat and that makes the soft keys a bit easier to hit. Applications should use other keys instead to make it easier to navigate. An application designed without soft keys for another phone that uses the one and three keys actually makes navigation a dream. Your left thumb can easily hit the 1 and 3 keys while your right thumb can hit the 4-way navigation buttons and the select and back keys.
The screen is just amazing. Applications get a full 320x239 -- almost full QVGA for business apps or game playing. This is basically the normal 4:3 aspect ratio of a computer screen (although not that of wide screen displays). This is the resolution most people played Doom at "back in the day." Doom? Hey, that would make a great port to this phone. ;)
Let's see, what else can I talk about since the data is now public on phonescoop? I still can't really talk about how the applications perform. Bluetooth performs well. It's less restrictive than I would have expected -- but that may change before it actually ships, too.
The use of the phone as, well, a phone is pretty straight forward. The keypad locks on a configurable timer, which is great. It behaves pretty much like a normal "candy bar" style phone. When you flip it open, it automatically goes into speakerphone mode with both of the stereo speakers blasting the other end. This works very well. You can also dial with it open, too. Closing it goes back to non-speaker mode so you can pick it up for a half-private conversation.
The use of the external screen is limited to a few tools and messaging, although I can't figure why anyone would want to compose a message using the keypad when a keyboard is a flip away. While composing a message, when you flip the keyboard open it stays where you were which is absolutely brilliant.
Anyway, before I run off into land I shouldn't be talking about I'll stop now. Here's the link to the technical data at phonescoop. Naturally, it has the March FCC filing date, which many of us saw when this first hit phonescoop. I wonder who made them take it down? The FCC link does contain the user manual. Check out the highlights section.
September 16, 2005
The State of Bandwidth: 2004 -- Year of the 50 Mbps DSL Line
Wait? Did you say 50 Mbps? Why, yes I did! 2004? Yep. Doesn't everyone have a 50 megabit line already? It's soo last year, afterall. Ok, so I'm exaggerating. It's really only 47 megabits per second. Confused yet? Think I'm joking?
Well, here's the scoop. About the fastest DSL line you can get in the US is about 6 megabit or so. We've got one at home. It's great. Nice and fast. Gives 600 kilyobytes per second downloads. If you're lucky, you can get Verizon fibre optics at 15-30 megabits per second. Even better!
So why, then, is the US considered to be behind in broadband? Well, it's apparently due to the obvious. We are.
8 Mbps lines were the norm in Japan in 2001. That's four years ago. 12 Mbps for 2002, 26 Mbps for 2003, and 47 Mbps for 2004. Seriously (Data from this months IEEE Communications.)
So what gives? How come we're so backwards here in the US? Even if everone had top end lines with fiber we'd be behind DSL in Japan.
This may make you wonder: What of fibre in Japan? There's a term for fiber like this (fibre, fiber, whatever): FTTH. That stands for Fibre to the Home. FTTH in Japan looks to already have -- or shortly have -- 1 Gbps lines available. Say, did my jaw just see your jaw on the floor? Apparently 100 Mbps FTTH lines have been available for a while and the norm is a 622 Mbps line.
Upload speeds are equally wonderful. The 100 Mbps lines are synchronous. The 622 Mbps lines give 156 Mbps uplinks and the 1Gbps lines are ... wait, that can't be right -- but it's printed ... 1 Gbps! Actually, the lines are typically shared in a cluster of houses or condos using normal 100 megabit ethernet. But it's still pretty darn fast.
Where's _my_ fast DSL???
September 14, 2005
Work-Arounds: Not Always Lame and Boring
This has got to be one of the funniest work arounds. Sound recorder has this "problem" that it only records up to 60 seconds (which is really the design, given it's been that way for 10+ years). However, this is officially how you get around that problem:
To increase the maximum recording time in Sound Recorder, click Insert File on the Edit menu, and then insert the Blank.wav file that you saved in step 3. When you do this, the maximum recording time is increased by 60 seconds. You can repeat this step once for each additional minute of recording time that you want to add. For example, for a 5-minute recording time, insert the Blank.wav file five times.
Yowza! ;)
How to Increase the Maximum Recording Time in the Sound Recorder Utility
MegaSound VRCD300-USB Update -- Again
A couple of updates, this time. First, because my commute is only about 35-40 minutes long I have been normally only burning Audio CDs (to the Ultra Speed CD-RWs, so it's a fast burn). This means I can burn directly from iTunes and the unit can read the disks fine.
But wait, you ask, why don't you burn an MP3 CD from iTunes? Wouldn't that be even faster? Well, yes, for the burn part it would be faster. And I did try that -- a couple of times. Unfortunately, the VRCD300-USB doesn't seem to want to read MP3 disks burned by iTunes 5.0. I don't know what it could be doing wrong. The unit reads the same content fine when it's burned with other software.
On another update, I want to take back some of what I said about the radio reception until the solar flare issues completely go away. This article at Discovery Channel explains that the last week has had one of the worst solar flare events in a couple of decades.
A rowdy sunspot cluster hurled a record-breaking flare into space on Wednesday, blacking out all high- and low-frequency radio communications on both American continents, causing power surges, blinding satellites and lighting up aurorae, and more trouble is likely on the way, say experts.
Given my tests were during this period, I don't want to knock the radio for the wrong reasons. I'll pick this up again in a couple of weeks. This is one of those things I would know if I kept on my amateur radio news. *sigh*
Shane Conder's Whateveritis of Nothing: More Info on the MegaSound VRCD300-USB
September 11, 2005
Keep Track of Receipts
Ever wanted to keep your receipts, but found that they are hard to keep track of, hard to read, and some even completely fade or turn black over time?
No problem... just scan them with this software. I haven't used it, but it sounds useful if you want to keep track of purchase stuff without the message of the receipts.
via The Gadgeteer
September 10, 2005
Painting!
So, last weekend (a nice three-day weekend for us because of Labor Day) we decided to start painting. Well, technically, we decided to start finishing up our downstairs bathroom that has been in shambles since not long after we moved in.
See, when we moved in it had this hideous wallpaper that we just had to get rid of. So, we started to strip it. We only got about 90% done before it got to the point where we would have to remove part of the toilet and remote the light fixture to finish up.
We then cut into the wall to expose a rather decent size storage area under the stairwar (the bathroom is situated right beneath our stairway). This was then lit up with some help of a friend to do some of the electrical work. That was the last that was done to the bathroom for many, many years -- until last weekend, that is.
We decided to get down to it and get it finished. This would both help keep use out of trouble (e.g. from driving all over while the fuel rates are tremendously high) and make us happy because we'd be getting something done on our house that has been weighing on us for many years.
So, we got some paint supplies, picked the colors, took down the fixture, removed the toilet, and began painted. A primer coat all around and a coat of white for the molding and ceiling and a coat of blue for the walls later we had finished. And it only took us small parts of three days to complete.
We also ended up with enough leftover paint that we wanted to try to find something else to paint since it wouldn't add any cost at all. This meant being able to do somethign for free!
So, we decided to do our secondary bathroom off of our office/bunny room. Today we primed and did the white coating while tomorrow we'll do the color coating.
Painting is great because it really refreshes a room, even if the colors are the same. In our case, the colors are different and not only is it really cleaning up the bathrooms, it's making them look new and fresh.
Unlike many people, we didn't actually repaint our house when we moved into it. Instead, we just left it the way it was because we wanted to get in ASAP. This means that the paint is now 5 years plus however long before the other people had painted. And it's really showing in many areas.
We're now looking around the house trying to figure out other areas that we can't paint without having to move all of our big furniture that is difficult to move (such as sideboards and other things that are full of glassware or wine).
In any case, painting also turned out to be easier and faster than either of us thought. None of us had ever really painting on our own before (our parents had, of course, but we weren't really involved). We didn't expect it to be terribly difficult or take very long, but it surprised us anyway, which makes us happy. It also makes it easier to get around to do again since it is a more known entity. Not only that, but our second time through has gone much smoother than the first and appears to also being going faster.
Now what to paint next? ;)
September 9, 2005
iTunes 5.0 Update: Local Podcast Directory Nuked! Arg! :(
So, I installed iTunes 5.0 this morning. Although I had seen the new interface on a nearby Mac, I didn't like it much. That said, I wanted to update anyway.
So, I did. And dammit, I shouldn't have! My podcast directory, of which I had subscribed to at least 40 different ones and had a number of others in it that were not subscriptions are all gone. Completely gone. Vanished. The audio files are still there, but now they're all mixed up in my library!
What the hell?!
I'm actually quite angry about this. I had been building up my selection of podcasts ever since 4.9 came out and I was fairly happy with the ones I had. Now I have to start all over!
I have to wonder if this has anything to do with the "subscribe to get rankings" bug that may have gotten some podcasts subscribed to that wouldn't have otherwise been found or popular? That would just be nasty, though.
*sigh*
Now to start all over again....
I've also discovered, in the process, that when I click on the album name of a podcast the search feature normally doesn't find it. So I'll type it into the search thing above the failed search, and it still won't find it but that gives me the opportunity to choose to search in "Podcasts" instead of "Music" or "Audiobooks" -- or "All", which I would have assumed would have included podcasts. This is making it rather time consuming to rebuild what the iTunes updater destroyed.
Thanks, Apple, for wasting my time (and more seriously, for having a soaring stock value -- but this sort of thing won't help it stay up!).
More Info on the MegaSound VRCD300-USB
I haven't spent any more time trying to get the USB reader to work better. In the past, I've tried USB 1.1 and USB 2.0 keys and card readers, all with the same results: the playback will hit a point where it will just skip to the next audio file. Since playing off the USB key also doesn't provide the fast forward function like playing MP3s off of CD, I've basically decided it's not very useful. Maybe the MegaSound guys can change my mind with a good support response when I get around to mailing them.
So, I decided to go down the route of using MP3 CDs. My first attempt was with a CD-R. That actually worked just fine. Of course, with a CD-R, it's basically a one-time use thing, especially if you throw on podcasts or something as opposed to some music you'll listen to a bunch.
So, next, I tried an old CD-RW, not knowing if it would even be able to read CD-RWs. The disc burned fine, but when put into the VRCD300-USB it completely flopped. The playback was all skipping, but not like from the USB key -- just normal audio skipping. That was a bit of a let down.
However, I decided it was probably just the disc -- and this was confirmed when I tried to read it in another MP3 CD player with no luck. So, after some searching at the local Fry's, I finally found some new Ultra Speed CD-RWs to try out. Just about every CD-RW for sale at Fry's was either that old style that only burn at 1-4x or the High Speed one's that only burn at 12x. I finally found some Memorex ones, though, that would burn at the full 24x of "new" CD-RW drives (which have been around for years). These were the only ones I could find there, and weren't cheap. But a 5 pack was only around 6 bucks, so I grabbed them -- I really only needed one or two.
In any case, I burned both an audio CD straight from iTunes (an m4a, so I didn't have to bother transcoding it) and a few MP3 files. Both of these discs worked fine. The only problem I have had so far is with one of the data discs I burned I have to keep pressing the button to switch from radio to CD a few times before it detects the disc, but then it works fine. Another data one I burned doesn't have this problem and neither does the audio disc I burned.
September 7, 2005
A Perspective from Within: Katrina from a Ham
I recently have listened to a couple of episodes of Trailcast, a relatively new podcast about hiking (thanks to Laurie for pointing out the podcast). Bob has had some great people on for interviews. As it turns out, he lives amidst the disaster area from Katrina. Also interesting is that he is a ham. In a reponse to a recent post by Laurie, he sent this, which I found to be very interesting (edited slightly):
[snip] [...] I have been working as a volunteer HAM radio operator for the local chapter of the Red Cross. I have been doing this since Katrina made landfall, and have not had access to the Internet. I feel touched by the emails asking about my situation, and offering their sympathies. The media seems to be offering a relatively accurate description of what is happening in the disaster area-- looting, violence and utter pandemonium. However, the volunteer efforts by the citizens of Baton Rouge have inspired me and made me feel proud to live in this town. [snip] I have been bouncing back and fourth between shelters making sure they are staffed with local HAM radio operators and making sure they have the equipment and resources they need to keep communications open. Believe it or not, HAM radio communications are still being used as a reliable (if not primary) communication channel between most shelters, the Red Cross local chapter and the National Chapter command center. Land line and wireless service is being restored. This is NOT a statement in anyway about the quality of repair efforts, which have been miraculous, IMHO-- This is just a description of life at my end of the radio. I will have more information and am thinking about making a Podcast about what I have been observing since Katrina made landfall. Trailcast will be back in swing soon.
I've been lightly following the communications events of Katrina within the amateur radio world. A lot of emergency communication has been taking place there. The media appears to be completely deaf to it, though. On NPR the other day, they had someone on talking about it and the only real mention was that even the officials could not communicate because their own towers were down. Well, the military is better at communications than that. So are hams. Many hams I know are or can easily be self sufficient for electricity and other needs for communications. Certainly there are not enough amateurs to provide full communications services -- especially since many, if not all, have their own hurricane recovery issues to worry about. However, in various forums and newsgroups there are stories about hams heading down that way to help with the communication -- sometimes even being on the fringe can be helpful because it can provide valuable repeating service and other such things.
In any case, between this and the lack of media coverage of any sort of amateur radio related activities (which nearly always go on during an emergency) I had to post something about it. Maybe someone will now know that which the media is not reporting. (And yeah, I'm also fairly positive there are plenty of other volunteer activities by groups and especially individuals that are not noticed or reported on.)
September 2, 2005
Catan for the N-Gage!
This is a translation of the Settlers of Catan boardgame, one of our favorites. This may seriously make be drag out my N-Gage for a while again. Heck, it might even get Laurie using it. ;)
Settle, harvest and build your civilization to dominate the island of Catan in the first hand held version of the classic best-selling board game. Roll the dice to see what recources will be given to you, then put them to use by building new roads, villages and cities. Place your settlements wisely, and with a bit of luck the island will be yours! The captivating mixture of strategy and interaction make the game intense and instantly addictive. The high quality graphics and attractive Japanese style illustrations guarantee that the game also stands out visually.
I'm sure it means virtually roll the dice, but still. It sounds great. It's due for release this month, too.
September 1, 2005
Strange Tech History Tidbit
So, I get daily alerts of little tidbits of factoid in my SMS inbox. One of them I get is technology history. The latest one was rather amusing. Most of the time you get some accomplishment or another. However, this time, it wasn't quite an accomplishment:
"The first transatlantic cable fails after less than 1 month of service."
Whoops.
