Blogger 1.1 available
Blogger v1.1 now available. Added temporary save/load slots for entries.
Blogger v1.0 released
Check out my projects page to get a copy. It’s a little tool I developed for simultaniously generating the HTML and RSS blog feeds used on this website. You can see the project page for details, downloads, etc. I generated this very entry with it!
Google Earth
Wow, wow – I am amazed by this thing.
The technology to do this has been around for years; but nobody has put them together until now. It is a map that has taken satellite images and overlayed them on topographical and street maps. You can zoom around in 3D, pan, and explore the entire world with actual satellite images overlayed on it – all for free.
I was just using it to plan out some possible photo shoot locations for my trip to Bend this weekend. It helped me see where some good sunrise/sunset shots might be taken from without even leaving my chair here in Portland. This is really close to real-time updating globe described by Neal Stephenson in his book the Cryptonomicon. If such a technology existed for the masses, you wouldn’t even really need CNN anymore – just go look at the events unfolding yourself. Imagine watching battles, demonstrations, parades/festivals, all in real-time from home.
It has made me realize again and again how much our society is in desperate need of some new tools to make sense of these new capabilities. Well, not new, but emotional, moral, and spiritual tools that people need when given these major shifts in information available to each of us. Human beings need a way to make sense and assign value to the many events in our lives. As a chaplain, I have been seeing this dynamic powerfully at work in the hospital. People become paralyzed and act very irrationally when they can’t make sense of what is going on to them. How do we go about avoiding this fate as we advance in technological understanding?
mattfife.net is alive
In case you didn’t notice, I’m the proud owner of my first domain name on the web: http://mattfife.net.
I got it from a great domain hosting service (www.1and1.com) that gives you domain registration, 25mb/mo transfer, 10mb storage, free emails, sub-domains, a 90 day money-back guarantee and a lot of nifty extras for $29/6mo. They also don’t hold your domain name hostage if you try to leave.
So far it’s an excellent service – very fast, great ftp support, etc. As added fun, it was very interesting getting spam emails after registering a domain name. A bunch of no-name companies congratulated me on my new domain and asked if I’d like to buy a whole bunch of stupid products/consultation services to help optimize it’s ‘business potential’. They were clearly form emails, and likely generated by scripts that watch the Internic for new domain registrations and pull the email address of the owner and mail them. Oh the fun of computer automation…
RSS feed active!
I undertook a little coding project for fun. After a number of requests, I’ve added a RSS feed to the site for you bloggers. I wrote up a little C++ app to update my blog in both HTML and RSS 0.91/XML format. The RSS feed only keeps the last 10 articles. The code for the blogger is really messy right now; but works. I’m planning on cleaning it up and then publishing the writer class. It’s silly nobody has released such a tool before…
That blinky feeling
Was driving today when all of a sudden I noticed that my left turn signal was blinking twice as fast as the right. Ahhh, I realized, this isn’t right. I went out and checked the bulbs and sure enough – the front signal bulb was out. So why does it blink twice as fast when a bulb is out? Because the relay (which switches based on a capacitor) gets more juice (because now the bulb isn’t using it), ‘fills’ up faster (2x faster because 1 bulb is now gone) and trips twice as often. Screw out the old bulb and put the new bulb in for about $1 at the local auto parts store and voila! Perfection.
Been a wild ride for the old Altima lately. After 12 years and 150,000 miles, she starting to need some repairs that I’ve been putting off. I’ve got 2 torn CV boots that can only be fixed by replacing the axles. Surprisingly not too expensive and good because you also get CV joints with them (which needed to be replaced like oh… 50,000 miles ago). Minor oil leaks galore but none that really need real fixing (rear main seal costs $300 vs. $1 for a quart of oil every 3 months). I just had to replace the radiator which had cracked at least twice and finally split beyond repair. Only took an hour from start to finish though – so that was easy. I also replaced a water pump recently; though I discovered later that the original was really OK – but now I don’t need to worry about it for years. Tricky part about the water pump was that I need to unbolt and jack the engine up just to get it out. No joke – that’s what the official guide said. And it was true. Took 6 hours. What a pain – they sure don’t design cars like they used to – meaning the average mortal might actually be able to fix it. I also seem to have some strange electrical problem/short going on; but have been unable to isolate it. Had the alternator out and tested at two places which both said it was OK (which is good because a new one wholesale was $170 – which is outrageous for an alternator. Sucker should be made of gold for that price).
But I’ve also discovered the beauty of a brand new source of do-it-yourself parts – the junk yard. There’s a GREAT one in Hillsboro – they have a great parts database and if they don’t have it they can check the inventory of most of the major other yards in the area. I’ve found almost everything that way. Just take some tools into the yard and tear out the part you want, bring it up to the counter and they’ll charge you something insanely cheap. Man is it fun!
Half-life bug fun
It’s no secret my favorite game is Half-life 2 – especially Counter-strike. Unfortunately, there are some fun bugs in HL2, and here’s an interesting list of bugs with pictures and/or demos of them happening.
Gamers manifesto
This guy has really captured some of the funny, but all too common problems with games.
My personal favorite is #14 about crates. It was a running joke while I worked at Intel in the graphics and 3D technologies lab. There was a hidden developer acronym for the phenomenon: TTC (Time To Crate). It could be used in sentences like ‘What a lame game – the TTC was zero!” TTC is the measure of time between the first moment of the title screen until you saw a crate on the screen. Try it – many times the answer is zero. Why? Because the very first scene starts you in a room full of crates!
The TTC metric often is used as THE metric of rating the creativeness of the artist that made the game.
Camera is back in time for tulips
Got my digital SLR camera back. Only $185 worth of damage – ouch. Problem was that the auto-focus points were no longer picking up focus. No clear indication of what exactly went wrong; I’m going to email them for a part list.
I must hand it to the extremely excellent job Canon’s official repair service did. I’ve had a lens and 2 cameras fixed by them over the years and each time the item comes back almost better than new – especially in cleaning and tuning up. They are hands down the most excellent repair service I’ve dealt with. What’s cool is that it’s back in just enough time for the tulip fields to bloom. Time to get shooting!
Canon 300D(ead) + Oregonian
I had to ship my digital rebel in for repairs because it died. I loaned it to a friend, because he was thinking of buying one; but it just stopped powering up. No idea. I was evaluating the Canon 20D at the time, and man oh man, that camera is really the bomb. I have to say that it is a huge step up from the 300D, it made me really salivate, but I just couldn’t justify the cost. Now, perhaps, the decision might be made for me. On the fun side, it’s great when things die just outside the warranty. 🙂
I got into the Oregonian front page article on the pope’s death this last Sunday. I interviewed with a friend of mine, Shelby Oppel Wood at the Oregonian. I hadn’t seen her for almost 3 years; since the last article she did on me. She’s a fun person to talk with and you can find the article here.