Awake

Like Dandelion Dust Movie Teaser Posted to Highwater Pictures Production Diary

Seth has created a promo video for the upcoming movie Like Dandelion Dust based on the novel by Karen Kingsbury.

Go check it out! Here's the link: Like Dandelion Dust Movie Teaser.

The Victorious Journey to Utter Let-Down

The rumor was turning true: a shipment of Wii consoles were to arrive at Fred Meyer that night.

O, would we never had heard that rumor.

Yes, it was Christmas vacation. Family gathered. Presents opened. Table games played and played again. But despite our best efforts to attain contentment, over us loomed, The Wii Rain Check.

We had only to locate a console. Impossible? Indeed. Unattainable? Of course. Should we have waited a month? Duh. But calls were made. Morning trips to local retailers taken. For what?

For NOTHING.

But then. The RUMOR.

7:45 pm. I had stopped by the Beaverton Fred Meyer on my way back from volunteering at the dispute resolution center at City Hall. It was right across the street. I would just pop in and ask.

"Yes." The retail clerk at the electronics department nearly beamed as he explained, "Yes, a shipment may be arriving this evening. Call at 6:30 am tomorrow to confirm whether or not the shipment arrived."

Oh sweet gem of information! I resisted calling The Homeplace where my two brothers, aka The Recipients, where likely quite content playing Mario Kart on the '64.' No, I wanted to see their faces when I told them the news: "Wii consoles were arriving at a local Fred Meyer tonight."

I felt like a hero. The news was received triumphantly. Groans followed, at the prospect of waking up at 6:30 am just to get, what was in the grand scheme of things, just a stupid toy. The evening progressed with a buzz of anticipation.

10:40 pm. Anxiousness declared victory. People of action, un-content with malcontent, the phone book was retrieved. One Fred Meyer was called in Hillsboro. "No shipments today."

10:43 pm. The Beaverton Fred Meyer was called, the site of the rumored shipment.

"Yes! We just received them!" declared the representative on the other end of the line. What! We all stood up. Unbelievable!

"So they're available?!" my sister-in-law quickly confirmed.

"Yes!" the clerk replied.

"So we can buy one right now?"

"Yes," the clerk replied.

"And you're open until 11pm?"

"Ye--".

We were out the door, inadvertantly leaving the sister-in-law who was on the phone behind.

10:47 pm. We departed from an area in Washington County near 185th and West Union. We were headed to Beaverton. Under normal circumstances, the trip would take 20-30 minutes, depending on traffic on 26 and 217. This time of night, it would probably take 12-15 minutes.

My car only nearly choked twice. I really should have already taken it in for the 100k maintenance. But gifts trump car mainteance — at least in December. Evenso, we were making good time. The Little Engine That Could, a '98 Saturn SL, fed off our combined adrenaline and brought us to the door of the Beaverton Fred Meyer at

10:58 pm.

Eleven minutes later and two minutes before closing, doors slammed and we ran to the entrance. Composing ourselves, we walked nonchalantly to the Electronics counter. Hastily, we looked for an employee. Were we in time?

We found a clerk in Electronics. Our hero. Oh the sweet anticipation.

"Do you have any Wiis?" we inquired.

"Yes," he declared importantly. "They're locked in my office."

"Can we purchase one?" we wondered, as politely as we could muster.

"No," the man in the white shirt and black tie replied. He started to back away.

"But it's 10:58." I offered. Maybe he didn't know that the store was still open.

"I know it's 10:58." Apparently, he did know. But his reply now decidedly included a noticieable tone of "snark."

"We just talked to someone in this department who said we could buy one before closing. That's why we're here." Now were were really confused. But "confusion" was not to be our fate tonight. No, tonight, we were to be served a Thanksgiving-sized platter of "Utter Let-Down." That was our fate this evening. He replied:

"I'm in charge here." He was beginning to look very short in his little Fred Meyer manager's outfit. Maybe it was the change in perspective as he not-so-slowly-anymore backed away. Maybe it was the change in our attitude. "I don't know who you talked to" (it was you, you little short man) "...but they're not for sale until the morning. Come back at 7. Everyone gets a fair chance." Jaws dropped. Eyebrows furled in disbelief. But he was most definitely walking away now. We were finished.

We were defeated.

We were incredulous. We walked silently back to the car. The woman in the car we parked next to must have thought were were crazy teenagers out looking for trouble. She would have been half-right. We were too old for this and should have known better. But oh the thrill! Oh the adventure! Oh the utter and complete let-down.

The car doors shut and we exploded in disbelief, conspiracy theories, and finally laughter. The sister-in-law who was left behind called, "Did you get it?!"

"No," I replied. "The manager with a short man's complex said 'He's in charge here' and wouldn't sell us an item that he declared to be in-stock."

"What?!" she replied. She would tell us more when we arrived home.

She explained that she had called again to confirm that, yes, they were in-stock, yes, they were available right now to buy, and yes, they were open until 11 pm and if we got there in time, they could be ours.

But it all turned out to be a bunch of incredible lies. Were we lied to unwittingly or was it intentional? We will never know. Defeated and deflated, disenchanted and disgusted, we vowed never to buy a Wii from that Fred Meyer.

The End.

EPILOGUE

January 8, 2007. 11:00 am. Seth and April found the Wiis at Target in Olympia! Hooray! Me thinks a road trip to Olympia is in my future...

How I Defeated a Corrupt FileVault and Saved Thousands of Innocent Files

So how did you spend your Christmas vacation? I spent part of it saving my Powerbook from the clutches of "Vile Vault."

FileVault (aka "Vile Vault") is a "security feature" on OS X that encrypts a user's data into a single encrypted disk image file called "username.sparseimage." The feature is off by default and I decided to turn it on just in case my laptop ever got stolen. (I was about to go on a trip to India at the time.)

I've used it for about a year now with no trouble. That is, until Christmas Eve "Eve." My applications stopped opening, so I decided to restart. Apparently that was a mistake. When I tried to log back in, I got a message stating that I couldn't be logged in at this time. I tried resetting the password. No dice.

Irony of ironies, I discovered that this message is actually a "feature" of 10.4.6. Unbelievable. I was prevented from logging into my supposedly corrupted FileVault (user account) because I have the latest version of OS X installed. Again I say: "Unbelievable."

My conclusion? Revert to a previous version. I couldn't locate my Tiger disks, but I did find my Powerbook Software Restore disks that had Panther (10.3.5) on it. So after fixing permissions, repairing the disk, running every program on Disk Warrior (no dice!) and playing a lot of Scrabble, I did an "Archive and Install" and voila! Access granted.

Granted, the old bird was crippled for certain. I hobbled around, nearly hypmotized by the Everlasting Rainbow Spinning Beachball of Please Wait Land, salvaging all my photos, music, web sites, documents, copying them onto an external FireWire drive (or two). There were a few files that I was unable to copy for reasons beyond my understanding, but I had them backed up in other places. (I am so grateful I got an iPod Nano for my birthday and had already saved my music!) Once I was satisfied that I had backed everything I wanted to keep, I installed OS 10.3 again, this time performing an "Erase and Install." The computer was just like new. Literally.

So now, I'll find my Tiger discs and do another clean install and restore all my apps, photos, and music. And I'll never ever ever turn on FileVault again.

Why did FileVault go to the Dark Side in the end? My theory is video editing. 95% of the time, whenever I edit videos in Final Cut, I use an external drive as my scratch disk. A time or two (recently) I got lazy and edited them on the Powerbook's hard drive. With FileVault turned on, hard drive space gets rapidly sucked away when editing videos, but "luckily" when I would restart, it would recover the lost disc space. I think the practice of saving video content on my FileVault eventually corrupted it. I can't prove this; it's just a theory.

Lessons learned:

1. Schedule regular backups
2. Don't turn on FileVault
3. Be smart about locations of Final Cut Pro scratch disks (don't use a hard drive with an OS installed on it)

Happy New Year.

Toys

Ahh toys.

I've added a little toy to this blog: a "cbox." (I think that's supposed to mean "chat box.") Which means....yes! You TOO can leave me a message, chat with others who are also visiting this blog or WHAT HAVE YOU. Amazing. Look to the West (left) to see what I'm talking about.

Currently my favorite toy at home is my TiVo. I love my TiVo. The only I don't like is that doesn't play well with my Mac. Well that will change. I am planning on partitioning my G4 tower and installing XP on it so that it WILL (oh yes) WILL play nice with my TiVo, allowing me to record DVDs and other such goodness. After all I can't really be expected to record stuff to VHS tapes, can I? I mean, isn't that some form of geek sacriledge or something? Not sure about that, and admittedly it is a little sickening to think about trying to install XP on my Mac, when TiVo is already connected to my VCR and I just have to run down to Freddy's for some blank tapes to get rolling. But that's a little too simple, isn't it. (Just say "Yes, Amber. Yes it is.")

I also got a Roomba on Woot for cheap. But I haven't let it come out to play yet. Soon, though. Very soon.

Exciting times, we live in. Very exciting.

Silly Silent Home Videos

Over on at Another Place for Amber, I've uploaded a bunch of the little 12 second, no audio, videos that I've taken over the last couple of years on my digital camera. Most of them should load pretty quickly, even if you're on dial-up, although the first time through might be a little jumpy. If that happens, just play it again and you'll probably notice that it plays back a little smoother. Here's the link to the Videos!

Happy silly silent video watching!

Worth reading: Sitepoint's "HTML and CSS: An Absolute Beginner's Guide"

For all you blogging web tweakers, might I suggest this excellent primer on XHTML and CSS:

HTML and CSS: An Absolute Beginner's Guide [HTML & XHTML Tutorials]

Even if you've already been hacking your code and stylesheet, read it anyway...you might just learn something you never knew you always wanted to know.

If you have any questions about the concepts or code in there please feel free to ask me...after you've read it all the way through. ;-)

Awake's Feed Updated

Just had a little "oh maaaaannnn" moment. Shawn pointed out over the weekend that my feed wasn't up to date and so I took a look at it and sure enough, Sarari had my last post dated as January something-or-another. "Wha-?" I thought to myself. So I added an atom.xml index template to my MT templates and that seemed to fix the Safari issue. But this morning I checked my Feedburner feed and still it was showing January. Again with the "Huh?" Well I figured my RSS feed templates were not rebuilding properly and sure enough I had (in January) un-checked the "Rebuild this template with indexes" and ever since then, they haven't updated.

And now we pause for the obligatory "Doh!" moment.

:-O

[Un-pause]. So, for the interested, here's my really-truly-up-to-date feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/Awake. If you're on a Mac running Safari (the blue compass thingy program), just click the blue RSS button on the right-hand of the web address entry box, then bookmark it. In the future, when you click on Safari's bookmarks menu, there will be a number of new in parenthesees next to the bookmark's name. Fancy, huh?

Getting files to the web on a Mac

If you're wondering how to check up on all those files you've been uploading to your blog or are looking for an FTP program for your Mac, check out this guided tour on O'Reilly. (My fave? Transmit.)

The Intersection of Healing and Reconciliation is Touch

As my choices have directed me to walk the seemingly parallel paths of mediation and massage, I am beginning to discover why I have chosen these two vocations and how they apparently relate to one another.

A helpful piece of this puzzle was placed the other day when I received my weekly installment of PeaceMeal: Food for thought on Biblical Peacemaking — a ministry based on Ken Sande's book The Peacemaker.

In it, the newsletter author chooses as a central to this week's newsletter, Genesis 33:4: "But Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms around his neck and kissed him. And they wept."

Each issue begins with a quote from The Peacemaker and this week, part of this quote is that "God does not intend for people to relate to one another at a distance or through other people. Genuine relationship involves personal communication." Sande also refers to Exodus 33:11, "The LORD would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks with his friend. (see also 2 John 12)."

In mediation, when I contact a party, my first goal is to encourage or coach the person to talk to the other party in the dispute face to face. In fact, we learn in training that a good indicator for mediation is when face-to-face communication has failed — spectacularly. At that point, if both parties agree, a neutral 3rd party mediator can actually render a good service by "merely" facilitating a face-to-face conversation between two or more disputing parties.

But further into this issue of PeaceMeal, the author asks the question "Do you relate more face-to-face or screen-to-screen?" The author continues by noting the abudance of "connectedness" in this day in age but challenges the nature of this connectedness (especially technology) that connects us at a distance—and keep us there. The author does not blame the tools, but keeps the blame appropriately with us and our preference of "distance to closeness, and darkness over the light" — and of course our love to be "in style". ;-) Through and because of our gadgets and access to technology we actually believe that we are connected to one another. But what Sande warns is that the ideal relationship is face to face and this connection at a distance is far from fufilling. As a matter of fact, connection primarily via technology catalyzes quite an ironic effect: I, and perhaps "we", feel lonelier than ever. Noting Luke 15:17, the question is posed that perhaps we need to come back to our senses like the prodigal son, as he returned to his father and actually felt his embrace.

It was this emphasis on touch that made me realize that the intersection of healing and reconciliation is touch. These paths I have chosen in mediation and massage are not parallel, they intersect, weaving in and out of each other's paths because of how they espouse and nurture healing, peace, restoration, however differently from one another—one in body, the other in relationship—but both dealing essentially with the soul. Both addressing the problem of disconnectedness, of brokenness, of pain. Both trying to rectify these problems with peacemaking and healing. (Whether through lavender or laughter, the goal is the same: peace and healing.)

So what does "face to face" have to do with touch? Because only by being face to face does the opportunity for healing touch exist. No amount of typing colon, hypen, and right-paren combinations :-) can replace the sensation of healing touch.

If you "continue reading" I've included the whole of the newsletter and you can read it for yourself. I encourage you to subscribe to the newsletter as well. I've been a subscriber for a couple of months now and they have been consistently good and definitely, as advertised, "food for thought."

(The following is taken from the e-newsletter PeaceMeal.)

Senses and Sensibility

"But Esau ran to meet Jacob and embraced him; he threw his arms around his neck and kissed him. And they wept."

Genesis 33.4

God does not intend for people to relate to one another at a distance or though other people. Genuine relationship involves personal communication. As Exodus 33:11 says, "The LORD would speak to Moses face to face, as a man speaks with his friend" (see also 2 John 12). If this is the idea for a true friendship, it is also the ideal for a relationship that has been broken by conflict and needs to be restored. Although other people can sometimes help get the restoration process started, its ultimate goal should usually be a personal, face-to-face meeting between those who have been estranged, so they can express and confirm repentance, confession, and forgiveness and experience together the grace and reconciliation of God.

Taken from The Peacemaker: A Biblical Guide to Resolving Personal Conflict by Ken Sande, Updated Edition (Grand Rapids, Baker Books, 2003) p. 148.

Food for Thought

Do you relate more face-to-face or screen-to-screen? Why?

We live in a time of connectedness. We are connected via e-mail, the Internet, our cell phones, Blackberries, and iPods. And those are just the avenues that readily come to mind. Being connected now ranks among the necessities of life, alongside food and shelter. But for all the beneficial ways (and there are many) that these technologies connect us, they connect us at a distance. And we find ourselves in a far country.

As Ken reminds us, the ideal for a friendship or relationship of any kind, is speaking face to face; God does not intend for people to relate primarily by way of distance. Notice the physical beauty inherent in Genesis 33.4. Jacob receives an embrace; have you ever felt the warmth of a hug from your iPod? Esau throws his arms around Jacob's neck; it's a little hard to feel the rough, hairy arms of your brother by way of a cell phone. Esau kisses Jacob; ask anyone in love if they would rather have the tactile sensations of a kiss or an e-mail full of emoticons. And then the two brothers weep; the Internet can raise the level of information in our heads, but can it cause our defenses to fall, so that tears spill from our hearts?

It's easy to blame these tools, as if they are the problem. No, the problem is where it has always been--with us. We prefer distance to closeness, and darkness over the light. These tools just help us do it in style. We stride through life, gadgets in our pockets, patting ourselves on the backs, believing we're really connected. But a close look at the eyes reveals our souls; we're lonely and wonder why. Maybe we all need one of those prodigal moments--"when he came to his senses" (Luke 15.17). True sense, as God intended, will return to us via our senses. It means being hungry enough to feel the pains in your stomach, or maybe your heart. It means feeling the burn in your legs as you run toward home or maybe the hurt from that broken relationship. It means feeling the embrace of the one you've been estranged from; an embrace that just might squeeze the tears out of you. That kind of closeness brings life out of death; it allows you to be found instead of lost. And that story always ends with fattened calves, rings on fingers, and parties hosted by the Father; none of which can be enjoyed from a distance.

PeaceMeal is a publication of Peacemaker® Ministries. Copyright 2006. Reprinted with permission. To sign up for this free weekly email publication, go to the Peacemaker Ministries website at www.Peacemaker.net.

Tech Reading List: 2 new articles from Sitepoint

Two recent articles on Sitepoint caught my eye:

Get On Track with Ruby on Rails

and

Improve Usability for Older Users

So tonight...install Ruby and Rails on my pair server...or...read Goblet of Fire until the magic hour? Hmmmm.....a difficult choice indeed. ;-)

Ma.gnolia Social Bookmarking

Ma.gnolia is a new social bookmarking site that I think puts the "social" back in "social bookmarking." It's a very friendly site, still very young and it's already easy to be impressed by it. I've just begun my contribution, but I am already inclined to like it very much and use it well into the future.

Ma.gnolia Social Bookmarking: Search and Find Web Sites & Build Community Online.

First Mac OS X Trojan

Rumor has it that there is a trojan (think bad-for-your-computer) for OS X "out there."

As per ClamXav.com (a free OS X virus scanner) You cannot be infected by this unless you do all of the following:

1. Are somehow sent (via email, iChat, etc.) or download the "latestpics.tgz" file (even from someone you know/trust!)
2. Double-click on the file to decompress it
3. Double-click on the resulting file to "open" it

Finally, I plan on downloading the free ClamXav virus scanner tonight. If you already have it, be sure to update your virus definition list today.

The best security policy is to employ common sense and modern manners in your e-mail and instant messaging behavior. If you're forwarding out attachments that you received to a 10 of your friends because it's "so cute" or "so touching" it's best to stop that practice. You really don't know if there's a virus embedded in that moving poem or graphic of cute kittens--even if there is a Bible verse overlayed! If you have a virus scan program on your computer, be sure to keep the virus definition list up to date. Also, it's good practice to install your operating system's security updates as they come along. But most of all, don't open an attachment unless you were expecting it. It may be sooooo cute but it also could be sooooo baaaaaad for your computer and could wipe out all your cute and non-cute data.

Tags: osx, virus, security

Dan's Back. Watch Out.

Dan has successfully run the gamut of transferring his blog to a more permanent home, and he's back with what looks like a Very Fine Blog. He promises that more homemade movies are to come, but after the infamous Vadar dance, is this really something to look forward to? ;-) Nevertheless, The Nerdery is a fine place to pause and reflect on the oppressed life of nerds.

Seth's new blog: Ignite Revival

My brother Seth figures blogging is a great way to cast vision to his ministry teams, especially since he's juggling several projects that are still waiting for the launch sequence, metaphorically speaking. He also figures blogging will help keep momentum going for projects that are moving forward, but at times at a indiscernable pace. To avoid frustration from seeming stagnation, he's decided to grease the communication gears and has launched three blogs in one week. (Did I mention he's ambitious?) He had the domains already registered and with a little of my help, walked through the Blogger advanced setup with ease. I'll introduce each blog as it gets rolling. Today, I give you Ignite Revival. Seth has a passion to get 24/7 prayer going in Olympia, Washington. (Mmmm 24/7 prayer...sound familiar to anyone reading?) Yes, I know there's some people reading that are passionate about 24/7 prayer and city transformation here in Portland. So head on over to igniterevival.com give him some comment love and good ole' fashioned brotherly encouragement.

Assassination Attempt Made on Chinese Human Rights Lawyer Gao Zhisheng

In [dis]honor of Google China's compliance with the Chinese government's oppressive will, here's a bit of news that I noticed on the front page of The Epoch Times (in a news stand in front of the building where I work). I found the article online; here's the link:

The Epoch Times | Assassination Attempt Made on Gao Zhisheng [Updated]

Related:
Sites Google Agreed to Censor in China

The Nerdery Strikes Back

Dan Schrenk's The Nerdery is back and it looks like he picked up a copy of the latest iLife as well as a subscription to dot mac. Am I right, Dan? Apparently there's all sorts of Web publishing goodies packed into the latest iLife. For pro web designers, just don't View Source and you'll be able to make use of it *and* sleep at night.

Looking forward to distractions-a-plenty, Dan!

Link: nerdery.net (leave out the www and you'll be properly redirected)

Remote Access Apps for Mac

Ah the wonderful world of tech support for mom and dad. They've just switched to a mac and are, shall we say, grudgingly scaling the learning curve. In the meantime, I'm checking out remote access apps so that when they call me on the weekends I can just fire up my powerbook, connect to their display, and provide a real-time visual of how to do whatever task or fix whatever's broken. I'm finding this handy list of mac software for remote access very...well...handy.

convert video for the ipod

Taking advantage of unlimited weekend minutes, my brother Seth and I were discussing DVD sharing yesterday. I have been wanting to get an electronic database of our family's books and DVDs going so that we could "check out" each other's stuff while keeping track of it at the same time. (I'm thinking Delicious Library could do the trick.) Seth countered with the suggestion of creating a "Himes Family Video Server" where we could rip our DVDs into MPEG4 and share them using iTunes, perhaps in a similiar fashion as "Share My iTunes Library" works. He then wondered about storing MPEG4s of DVDs on a Video iPod (which you can then share on TV, as I mentioned last month). We agreed that since one can already rip a DVD to MPEG4 then you could certainly store and view it on a Video iPod. I think we were right. Here's an article I found today on how to do it:

Playlist: Convert video for the iPod

We'll file this away 'til next Christmas, which is when we want to wait before asking for a Video iPod. We figure by then it'll be cooler than EVAR! But here's to the early adopters anyway.

;-)

Clippings Roundup

I've (finally) started using Bloglines to read/scan/skim updated blogs, zines, newspapers, etc. and one of the features is "Save to Clippings Folder". I've been meaning to post these as I go, but what a surprise, this task has been neglected. So here goes:

Techy stuff

• 43folders: Three OS X Timers— alarm clocks and timers that run on a Mac
• del.icio.us'd by vj (my office mate), PDX Super Crafty: Getting your creative business off the ground—applies to crafty-creatives not necessarily movie-making-creatives, interesting ideas though
• Posted on Macromedia Consulting Weblogs, a mashup of Yahoo! Maps Beta and some Webcams of the programmer's favorite skiing spots—mashup is the buzzword for creating something unique out of two or more existing (usually) digital things.
• Here's another Yahoo! Maps Beta Video mashup [Macromedia Weblog entry]
• Yet another Yahoo Maps! Beta mashup: Ivan Todorov of BLITZ | Blog: My Daily Traffic Report (as of this post, site took a while to load)
• If you want to dive in to developing a Flash app using the Yahoo! Maps Beta API, here's a simple example of how to do so. (Saving this for a snowy day...)
• Discussion of Safari CPU hogging issue, via MacInTouch
• Discussion of router problems, via MacInTouch
• Beta: Interrogate 0.7—a visual MySQL database manager for OS X, freeware. I'm using CocoaMySQL and I like it, but it seldom hurts to try something new
• For the iTunes glutton in all of us: Switch between two iTunes Libraries, via Mac OS X Hints dot com
• Via LifeHacker.com: Micro Persuasion: Ten ways to use Bloglines
• Also via LifeHacker, a nod to Atomic Learning's free online video tutorials for Tiger (OS X 10.4), Taming the Tiger: An Orientation to Mac OS X 10.4—mmmm video tutorials. I'm going to start producing these after the New Year. I've got my Snapz Pro, I'm wishing for a Logitech Desktop Microphone, and I've got Movable Type and Mac tutorial ideas aplenty to share...
• "Computer, What Day Is It?" Just discovered Tiger's voice command utility Speech. Very entertaining. Oh. And useful. Probably. ;-)
• Geek to Live: How to fix Mom and Dad's computer
• try ruby in your browser—ruby is a programming language I'm highly desirous to learn

Around the world

• BBC: Women resist 'honour' marriages—Five women from the same family in Pakistan's Punjab province have refused to be "united" with their prospective husbands as ordered by tribal elders.
• BBC: Girls Still Miss Out on Schooling—New figures show the UN has fallen well short of its target of getting as many girls educated as boys. (Maybe that's because it's a ginormous problem that needs widespread attention and coordinated strategy.)
• BBC: US firm to fight Somali pirates— I just thought it was somewhat ironic that there seems to be a comedic renaissance of pirate culture afoot in Internet-Land and here on the BBC is a story of US firm who's managed to score a contract for fighting pirates off the coast of Somalia. Who knew?

Fun(ny)

• Homestar Runner: Download All Our Playsets and Toys! ("cheap as free")—what will they think of next? I've only recently claimed victory over my random.bat Button Addiction

• Flickr Pool: MLK Blvd's around the world—who'll add photos of P-town's MLK Blvd.? (more about the project here)
• via Drawn!: animated shorts done in watercolor! La Papillon
• Of course you already knew that the third installment of X-Men is coming May 06: X3 Announcement Teaser, X3 Official Website

Thus endeth the linking extravaganza. Until next time, adieu and farewell.

New Utility Automates Transfer of iTunes Tracks to Final Cut Pro (finally!)

Sick of burning iTunes tracks to CDs and importing them as a usable format into Final Cut Pro? I am. And so is my brother. So...Seth, this one's for you.

This program Playlist2FCP completely automates the transfer of non AAC audio tracks from iTunes to Final Cut Pro. There's a 30-day trial and you can purchase via PayPal for 15 Euros (about 17 US dollars).

Link: Playlist2FCP

Update: Here's a list of more film production tools from this company: Some Film & Production Tools (by Spherico)

iPod Video to TV...cheaply!

Well this week two of my friends got video iPods...so this article's for you!

Getting the Video out of Your New iPod--for Cheap!

You can connect your Video iPod directly to a TV, and you can do it with the ordinary camcorder A/V-to-RCA cable you probably already have lying around your house.

You just have to be tricky.

Here's how.

Upgrade

Upgraded to MT 3.2 tonight. Just testing to see if anything breaks on rebuild...

Yahoo Maps Beta

Attended a presentation on Flash 8 last night and one of the sites demonstrated was Yahoo Maps Beta. This is a cool app.

Let's say you're going from point A to point B but you're gonna need to stop for gas someone along the way. You enter your addresses for A and B and then search for "gas station" under "Find on the Map." All the gas stations are labeled on the map and listed in the search pane. Click and hold one of the gas station points on the map and drag and drop it onto your directions, between A and B or after B. The route is re-drawn to include point C, the gas stop. Depending on if you want to stop for gas on the way there or on the way back, just drag point C where you want it in relation to A and B and the directions will be rewritten and the route on the map redrawn. Also, it can integrate live traffic data. Click on the orange link at the top of the map "Live Traffic."

All this is done in Flash integrating data from Yahoo Local and other data sources.

Link: Yahoo! Maps, Driving Directions, and Traffic

(update: working for me now! it was the company firewall!)

An amazing way to search amazon.com

Using a thing called "web services" which allows a web developer to create something on the web that uses the data from another site (with their blessing, of course), developers have come up with extraordinary ways to display data from our everyday web sites, like Google and Amazon.com for example. A site like the craigslist meets Google Maps application, HousingMaps.com is one example of using web services to remix existing data into something totally new.

I just came across this truly amazing rendition of displaying search results from amazon.com. It's called amaztype. You enter your search term and it displays images of the book covers in what at first seems to be a topsy-turvy manner. You can click on a cover to zoom in and get more info and click again on the cover to go to amazon.com's site to buy the book. But if you let the program run for a bit, you will see something very very

...it spells your search term with the cover graphics!!!!! Omigosh it's so cool.

Check it out: amaztype.

Google Maps and U.S. Census

Very cool GIS app combining Google Maps with demographic info from the 2000 U.S. Census report or the Housing Report. Link.

Learn to Filter Form Data with the PHP Security Guide

On of the highlights of my vacation to southern Oregon this past (extended) weekend was a spontaneously-planned dinner (featuring BBQ'd rainbow trout!) at my cousin Drew and his wife Kelly's house. Grandpa and I went over Monday night (which is their day off) and enjoyed wonderful food and long-overdue conversation. Drew and I fell into the abyss of tech-talk toward the end of the night, so as a sort-of follow-up, I thought I'd post this valuable intro to PHP Security. (This is where I got all my ideas for filtering form data and implementing security on my web forms and apps.) I've heard Chris (the author of this doc) speak on a couple of occasions; the guy really knows his stuff (and is passionate about it too).

He and some others recently organized the PHP Security Consortium and on their site, you can find the
PHP Security Guide and learn all about "filtering all foreign data!"

Happy foreign data filtering.

Tip: Delete Bad E-mail Suggestions from Outlook's Auto-Complete

With the bad e-mail highlighted, I now hit "Delete" and the suggestion will be gone!

I've always wondered how to delete an old outdated e-mail address from Outlook's sometimes helpful auto-complete function that kicks in when typing a name or e-mail into "To:".

It's actually maddeningly simple:

In Outlook, compose a new message. Start typing a name into the To: area. When an outdated/bad e-mail comes up, use the arrow keys to highlight the bad e-mail, then hit "Delete". That's it!

If you're dying to know more, here's the article where I got the info: Where do Outlook's auto-complete suggestions come from? - Ask Leo!

Thank you, Leo. Whoever you are.

Blogging classes postponed

We've decided to pull the blogging classes from the summer schedule at Three Rivers Tutoring.

I do want to still put together some class material. If any of you acquainted with me and in the Portland area have ideas or suggestions for what you'd like to learn (related to blogging or other Internet-related stuff), please leave a comment to let me know! I'd love to hear your ideas!

I may also post some information here on Awake as well as put together some classes. Stay tuned.

Economic Research Firm Offers Housing Cost Calculator

My favorite group of economic researchers, the folks at the D.C.-based Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) have just released the web-based The CEPR Housing Cost Calculator. I discovered that right now, I'm better off renting. Until I think I'm going to be settled somewhere for more than 10 years, it's more expensive for me to buy than to rent in Portland, Beaverton, or Vancouver. This is good news since I just signed another 1-year lease on my apartment. According to CEPR,

This calculator compares the cost of owning a home relative to renting for a potential new homeowner. The Housing Cost Calculator reports the "Net Cost of Owning" -- the expected amount of additional cash available to a renter compared to the amount available to a homebuyer who buys a home today and sells the home at a specified time in the future. The calculator takes into account the unprecedented run-up in real home prices since 1997.

Lax security on Interior computers contributes to ongoing injustice toward Native Americans

WASHINGTON, July 30 — One of the longest evidentiary hearings in the recent history of U.S. District Court here has ended with strong calls for increased controls over government computers holding information on individual Indian Trust accounts.

Citing the ease with which computer consultants hacked into the computers, lawyers for Indians in a class action lawsuit over the government's acknowledged mismanagement of the accounts finished 59 days of hearings Friday afternoon with a plea to disconnect the computers from the Internet.

"It is not just a matter of computer security," said the lawyers. "It is a matter of the security of the Indian's trust accounts, the only money that many of the nation's poorest citizens have," they said.

— Cobell v. Norton 7/30/2005 Press Release: Lengthy Hearing Ends with Pleas for Controls on Interior Computers

Connection, Culture, and Video

I've been amazed at the opportunities I've had to meet East Indians in the metro area just because I have a very small happenstance reputation for being able to shoot video in a cross-cultural setting.

This week, I was invited to be a part of a small gathering of families from the Indian state of West Bengal in a home in Wilsonville. I had the best Indian food I've ever had, enjoyed the company and conversation of women from Beaverton, and listened to Bengali music being played on a keyboard, sung into a microphone (...the most beautiful vocals I've ever heard!), and picked on a guitar. Oh, and captured the night on video.

Wednesday, I visited the new Hindu temple located on the HBC (Hall Blvd. Connection) just north of 99w in Tigard (behind the KinderCare, weird, huh?) Got a tour of all the deities they've acquired thus far (the temple only opened on July 6th, a couple weeks ago). In the old temple, which is still a worship place but also a sort of ashram for people in the region to stay when they visit the temple, I witnessed a small group of devotees perform their worship ceremony. And yeah, I was invited to capture the whole thing on video. And capture it I did.

Tonight I hit Lake Oswego to capture some of the wealth and if not tonight, tomorrow, will get to a restaurant and hopefully get to meet an East Indian dance and music instructor.

So I meet and connect with people in my area from India, glimpse into a very complex culture, and refine some technical skills I don't get to use everyday, all because my brother showed me how to take decent shots with a consumer-quality mini-DV camcorder. Thanks, tall brother!

Blogging Classes

Shawn Cardwell has given me the opportunity to teach some classes through his Three Rivers Tutoring Company, now located in downtown Lake Oswego. Depending on registrations, I'll be teaching four classes on blogging. They are (taken straight from the Summer Schedule page on Three Rivers website)...

August 10
6:30-8:00pm
Intro to Blogging
$40
In this session, you will learn all about a fast growing trend in Web publishing for the masses: weblogging or "blogging." We will cover the anatomy of a blog and common uses and purposes for blogs, all to help you decide if you want to leap into the blogging fray. If you've just started blogging using a free service such as Blogger, come learn more about it and the many other different options available in the blogging community. No prerequisite. All ages welcomed, including adults!

August 17
6:30-8:00pm
Blogging Software Overview
$40
Get ready to dive into blogging. In this class, we will compare and contrast the many different blogging software and service options available, including free and fee-based choices. We will explore the publishing features and limitations of each service or software, enabling you to choose your blogging service wisely. Prerequisite: Intro to Blogging, avid reader of blogs, or Blogger user. All ages welcomed, including adults!

August 24
6:00-9:00pm
Blogging Software Focus: Intro to Movable Type
$60
In this class, we will focus specifically on the popular Movable Type Web publishing platform. Not only is Movable Type used for personal and community blogs, but it drives content-rich sites such as About.com. We will cover the licensing agreement, learn how to create a new blog, choose a template, add authors and set permissions, set up category-based archiving, select appropriate general preferences, and navigate the administrative interface. Prerequisite: Blogging Software Overview or familiarity with Movable Type. All ages welcomed, including adults!

August 31
6:00-9:00pm
Behind the Scenes of Blogging: Making Sense of Templates
$60

You've discovered (or learned) how easy it is to publish content on the Web through blogging. But now you want to break out of the default templates that everyone else is using and use your own unique creation. For that, you'll need this class to learn just enough HTML and CSS to be dangerous--in a good way. We will cover opening and altering templates in Blogger, TypePad, and Movable Type, deciphering and writing simple valid HTML and CSS enabling you to alter the look and feel of your blog's templates. Prerequisite: Blogging Software Focus: Intro to Movable Type or a beginner's level experience using Movable Type. All ages welcomed, including adults!

Also offered:
package of all 4 blogging classes
$175

To register for any (or all!) of these classes, submit your information to Three Rivers Tutoring on the registration page. (You can just enter your name under "parent" info...this is primarily a tutoring company for school-age students.) You'll receive further instructions for payment as well as directions to the office via e-mail.

Support your local entrepreneurs!

Gadget envy

I don't think I'm important enough to own one of these palmOne LifeDrive Mobile Managers, but wow, something like that would fill a gadget envy vacuum quite nicely.

Awake's Friendly News Feed

Now that I've got a Tiger-ed Safari which has integrated inconspicuously into the browser's Bookmarks a place to store and view news feeds (aka RSS feeds) from other sites. This means that you could painlessly skim the latest news from the BBC or quickly see if your friend has finally updated his or her blog. To make sure Awake's feed was Safari-friendly, I went over to Feedburner and got my presently formatted RDF+XML feed converted to a browser-friendly format. Pretty cool!

So here's Awake's Feed.

Now go get your news feed fixed up all perty! All you need is the Web address of the "Syndicate this site" link. So click on that link in your blog, copy it, then paste it into Feeburner's form. So easy!

Update: For Movable Type users like Shawn and myself in which the default template already has news feeds (RSS and RDF) integrated into the templates, there's one more change to make once you get a RSS feed from Feedburner.

Near the top of your Index Template, replace...

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="http://www.sleepyheadcity.com/awake/blog/index.rdf" />
<link rel="EditURI" type="application/rsd+xml" title="RSD" href="http://www.sleepyheadcity.com/awake/blog/rsd.xml" />

...with your Feeburner URL. Awake's looks like this:

<link rel="alternate" type="application/rss+xml" title="RSS" href="http://feeds.feedburner.com/Awake" />

When you look at your blog in Safari, there will be a RSS icon in the address bar (where the URL is) that will point to your new Feedburner feed (and therefore work properly).

Hope that helps.

Tiger install report

Archive and install worked beautifully on my Powerbook. Installed in record time: 45 minutes.

Spotlight is currently indexing so login was a bit sluggish.

Tips for upgrading to Tiger and a full-proof never-date-again strategy

A colleague of mine passed this article on to my inbox this morning, as Tiger is coming our way in tomorrow's FedEx delivery:

Macworld: Feature: Installing the update

Probably won't get a chance to install the upgrade until Friday night. Unless I get a hot date. Or even a warm date. Or a cold one. However the statistical probablility of that happening is extraordinarily low, almost nill, considering the last time I went on a date on a Friday night (or maybe it was a Saturday), I puked on the 10 freeway. Who was my date? That will remain anonymous to protect the innocent. Plus it was a loooooooong time ago. Plus he's happily married now. Moral? Never mix antibiotics + codeine-laced cough syrup + a cheesburger at In 'n' Out Burger if you ever want to date again...in your twenties. (Hopefully the hiatus will end by my thirties. God help me.)

But I digress. Update on the upgrade hopefully Friday night for anyone who's interested.

Happy Tiger-wrastling. And happy date-finding. (Can Google Satellite give me a 20 on my husband? If it can't do that, I really don't understand the hype. ;-)

Next Bus (or Streetcar, as the case may be)

Discovered this Portland Streetcar tracking web site late last week: NextBus Stop Selector: Portland Streetcar (From Central Library to NW 23rd and Marshall). You choose the direction and stop and the page tells you how many minutes until its arrival. There's also a phone number with a 4-digit code associated with the stop that you could call to get the info. Pretty cool!

Helpers

Busy busy busy busy. That's my life and it amuses me. I chuckle quite frequently at the different things that I enjoy being involved with (some more enjoyable than others, of course). And I still have time to veg (almost theraputically) in front of the TV when I get home.

Anyway, I just thought I'd share some of the tools that I like to use in this little juggling act of a life I lead.

For project management I use Basecamp. I've evangelized this tool to several committees, cohorts, and gaggles I'm involved with and it's proven very successful. Seth uses it to keep his animators motivated and on track, the Building Committee uses it to track milestones, ideas, progress and keep the elders and staff in the loop, and I use it to move VISCOM (visual communications ministry) tasks along for Village's short-term teams (first India, now Lebanon).

I'm a list maker and I use the backs of 5"x7" Spellbound promotion cards (which we received by the thousands via hilarious snafu) to keep those synapses in my brain a-firing. I'm a creature of double-redudancy, so I also use Ta-Da lists to track mid-term items and personal goals. I haven't utilized Ta-Da's full functionality, which enables you to share and collaborate to-do lists.

I'm 27 out of 51 on the list at the library to check out David Allen's Getting things done: the art of stress-free productivity; maybe after I read it, I'll understand the hype and the enthusiasm inspired by the GTD (Getting Things Done) phenomenon which has produced far more extensive and useful ideas than I have shared in this little post. 43 Folders is a good place to start. Also 37signals (the makers of Basecamp and Ta-Da Lists) is coming out with a new GTD-friendly tool next week called Backpack that promises to be high on the super-fun, super-cool, super-useful meter.

Noah's Friends launch

We launched the Noah's Friends site over the weekend. This is the brain-child of my brother, Seth. He's written 12 episodes of the adventures of the animals who stuck around after the flood and turned the ark into their own personal clubhouse and home. A team of animators has been working on the characters and background designs — I've been amazed by the incredible talent. I did the web site working from a start from Seth's friend and am pretty happy with how it turned out. It was a fun project to work on, especially with all the incredible art to work with. Seth's pitch on the site casts vision very well, I think, and hopefully someone will catch that vision and enable Seth to run with it.

I set up a design gallery for the site as well. The animators have been working hard over the last year or so and Seth wanted an easy-to-update, professional, and organized way to display the various designs. Its powered by the same program (Gallery) that runs my photo site, The Gallery at Sleepyhead City. There's a little tweaking to be done on the design gallery's stylesheet, but it's getting there.

Check out the pitch for Noah's Friends, an animated series ...coming soon to DVD (God willing!!!)

Go Seth!

upcoming

Found Upcoming.org today. It's a social events calendar web site. There's a handful of events in Portland, some more personally relevant than others. So far, it seems like a place to spread the word about local concerts, but the potential of such an app seems like so much more. I added a few events to "attend" and "watch" for good measure.

Geography is fun

Warning: Amber the wannabe pseudo-geek emerges from her shell...

Oh how I love playing these geography games. I think my love of these games even surpasses the Toboggan Jump infatuation of 2002.

Sheppard Software's got...

• Europe Geography Web Games
• South & Central American Geography Web Games
• Asian Geography Web Games
• African Geography Web Games

...and oh so much more. Hours of geography fun and adventure await.

I conversed briefly over e-mail with Scott Sheppard, the president of the software company behind these geographical bundles of fun and he said there are plans for Mexican state and Canadian province games in the future. (How exciting is that?!!) This summer, I'd like to take a crack at developing a game to learn the states of India. I think that would be a fun summer project. When Alex(andra) graduates from art school this Spring, I can get my Flash game development book back and take a swing at developing my very first Flash app. It's all about the drag and drop widget. Oh yeah.

Post a Quicktime movie on your blog

Quick! Get the camera. It's time to post a QT movie on your blog. TSK shows us how:
TallSkinnyKiwi: Your Christmas QT movie on your Blog

Thank-you!!!!!!!

Drooling over a Delicious Library

Wow. It's pretty. It's functional. It's pretty. (Did I mention their site is very pretty.) Now that both my brothers are on OS X and my parents considering a G5 iMac after the wedding, maybe we can do some serious DVD/Book/CD swapping, instead of this 4-copies-of-everything-LOTR business at Christmastime.

Check it out: It's Delicious Monster's Delicious Library. (No relation to this del.icio.us social bookmarking site ...see awake's sidebar for my latest del.icio.us links.)

Thanks, Andrew Jones for the ref.

iPod Photo

This is weird. I was just wondering yesterday if iPods could display photos on the display. If you've got $500 bucks, they will:

Apple - iPod Photo

Very very cool, but I think I'll stick with my digital camera and the yellow video cord that lets me share my photos on a TV.

Shameless

Seen this?

Apple - iPod U2 Special Edition

New online book for PHP absolute beginners

(This message is for PHP beginners, though those of you already using PHP might find this resource to be of interest as well.)

I thought I would pass along the link to this new online book on PHP, Practical PHP Programming by Paul Hudson. This online book looks to be an excellent starting point for those of you interested in learning PHP. The author states, "This book assumes no PHP programming skill at all — you will be taught from scratch in that respect."

Incidentally, if you are interested in learning PHP, the php.net site and this online book are probably where you want to start (and naturally, are good references for those already using PHP).

Practical PHP Programming by Paul Hudson

Comments, etc. about the book can be found on the PHP blog, Dynamically Typed. (This is where I found out about the book. Thanks, Harry.)

Silence is a Israeli-made cellphone jamming device

The Seattle Times: Nation & World: Mexico churches find way to jam cellphones

MEXICO CITY — Fed up with cellphones ringing during Mass, four Catholic churches in Monterrey, Mexico, are taking extreme measures to silence them.

They are illegally jamming cellphone signals with Israeli-made transmitters, the kind used to protect embassies and presidential motorcades from bugs and bombs detonated by phone.

"These devices have solved a very big problem for us," said Gloria Cardenas Aguero, secretary at the Rosario church. "This time in church belongs to God, and you should respect it."

Interesting. On the one hand we have churches strategizing to use cell phones during church services and on the other hand we have churches buying illegal jamming devices to silence them.

What a world we live in.

Hat tip: Leah.

Inside Al-Qaeda's Hard Drive added to this week's commuter reading list

Inside Al-Qaeda's Hard Drive, Alan Cullison (The Atlantic Online, September 2004)

Jason Fried says, "Print this article out and give it a read when you get a chance. It's worth whatever time it demands."

Since his Webvisions presentation, I have come to respect the words that come out of Jason's mouth -- either on paper, screen, or in person -- so I have printed out this article and am adding it to this week's commuter reading list, which also includes:

• The July/August 2004 edition of Books & Culture
• A stone of hope: prophetic religion and the death of Jim Crow by David L. Chappell (on hold for me at the library)
• The dwelling of the light: praying with icons of Christ by Rowan Williams (also on hold for me at the library)

And today's "commuter reading list inspired" quote comes from "Omit Unnecessary Words: On the trail of faith and writing" by Andy Crouch (Books & Culture, July/August 2004, pg. 17):

It's not hard to look out over the audience and imagine a thousand children who "could actually be disciplined," as pastor and writer James Emery White recalls his own own childhood, "with the threat of 'no library for a week.' " There's something unsettling about seeing so many young adults intent on listening and reading. Shouldn't they be home, I find myself thinking, watching television?

Don't worry. We are. I am very unhealthily addicted to winding down after a day of coding in front of the accursed tele. In fact, just checked out Signs from the library. Can't wait to see it (again). Probably won't be for another week at least since I have to get a freelance client project wrapped up before I go camping this weekend on the beautiful Oregon coast.

Happy reading (and watching).

Found: Learning Movable Type Tutorials to Help Me and My Friends

Hey guys - found a very well organized and helpful site containing loads of help in learning movable type.

Here's a few that you might find helpful:

• Uploading Images and Photos
• What is Trackback
• Category Archive Pages and Displaying Categories
• Applying MT3 Style Templates to MT2.x (Shawn, you might want to read this one)
• Simple Changes to the Default MT3 Styles

Well, that should be enough for now. Happy learning!

Learning Movable Type: Tutorials and helpful tips for beginners to the Movable Type web publishing system

Sneak Preview of Tiger Released

Better search. Better Finder (finally). Sweet multi-way videoconferencing in iChat AV. This cool-lookin Expose-ish Dashboard thingamabob. And a Safari RSS client.

Schweet.

Apple - Mac OS X - Tiger Preview

Hangin' at the Habbo

Lil' bro Brant and I finally got a chance to check in to the Habbo Hotel. Went to the Boaz Lounge, as per TSK's instructions and had a great chat with a couple guys - one from Australia and the other from Texas. But I think, being a Friday night, the site started getting hit pretty hard and I had to leave the chat because the "words I was typin' just weren't comin' outta my mouth!" (My avatar's mouth, that is!) Oh well...I'll have to try that again another time! It was fun while it lasted.

Check in: Habbo Hotel - Home Page

Quotable Insight of the Day

From Fences and Windows: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the Globalization Debate:

[...]Like the Internet itself, both the NGO and the affinity group networks are infinitely expandable systems. If somebody feels that he or she doesn't quite fit into one of the thirty thousand or so NGOs or thousands of affinity groups out there, she can just start her own and link up. Once involved, no one has to give up individuality to the larger structure; as with all things on-line, we are free to dip in and out, take what we want and delete what we don't. It seems, at times, to be a surfer's approach to activism—reflecting the Internet's paradoxical culture of extreme narcissism coupled with an intense desire for community and connection.

—Naomi Klein. From the chapter, "What's Next? The movement against global corporatism doesn't need to sign a ten-point plan to be effective" July 2000.

This week's commuter reading list: PHP, Sustainable Economics, The "Emerging Church", and Calligraphy

Here's this week's commuter reading list: articles on the web printed out on the blank side of former printouts for my light-rail commute-home reading pleasure.

• PHP From The Command Line, Part 1 (SitePoint)
• Web Exclusive: Wendell Berry interview complete text (Sojourners Magazine)
• When We Stop Emerging (TallSkinnyKiwi's Weblog)

And then of course, there's The Illuminated Alphabet: An Inspirational Introduction to Creating Decorative Calligraphy, which I checked out from Central the other day.

I am happy reading.

What time is it?

clickity click this cool little clock

Tweaking Templates 101

I know there's a few of you who are currently learning how to modify your Movable Type blogs using CSS. I was going to write a tutorial for you guys, but it's already been done very nicely. I agree with Modifying the Movable Type CSS (Anders Jacobsen's blog), this guide is really beautifully done and easy to understand. Here it is: Illustrated MT Templates.

And for good meaure, here are a few of my CSS and Web design resources from the ole' bookmarks menu:

• NYPL Online Style Guide (quality XHTML & CSS resources a-plenty)
• Web Building Tips
• Color Scheme Generator (a new favorite!)
• Color Schemer Online v2 (an old favorite)

That should keep you going for a while.

Happy tweaking!!

iCal > movabletype

Another idea for the file drawer...publish iCal events to a MT blog:

timeline

Trackback and Pinging: How it Works

For the eager learner(s) out there (you know who you are), here's a great explanation of how pinging works and how to make use of the technology using MT's Trackback feature:

How Pinging Works

Happy learning!

Integrity in Web Design

TallSkinnyKiwi: A web site for Betel

As far as web design goes, I am a big believer in INTEGRITY. A web site should reflect with integrity and honesty the ministry that it represents. Not necessarily better or worse, not what they want to be, but what they are.

Um, yeah. What he said. Check it out.

Hat tip: Shawn.

iPhoto to Gallery

I've got an out-of-the-box-yet-to-be-customized Photo Gallery (using Gallery) up and running. (I call it, The Photo Gallery at Sleepyhead City.) And yes, I can export photos directly from iPhoto using iPhototoGallery -- which extends iPhoto's "Export" options to include an interface for uploading photos to my Gallery Web site.

I'm really happy with the feature-set for Gallery. It creates thumbnails, an intermediate version, then a full-blown hi-res version of the photo (which I limit in size to 1024x768 in the iPhoto to Gallery Export). I guess you can also order prints direct from Shutterfly and a few others. Pretty cool stuff!

It also has a registration option which allows users to create albums and add pictures as well. I maintain control over who can register, so hopefully it will be a fun place for family members and friends to share photos.

My First Syndicated Feed

If you would care to glance to your left -- what's that? Yes, it's true, I'm now syndicating my del.icio.us links (which I update much more frequently).

Helping my friend Shawn set up his MT blog has inspired me to finally get this whole XML RSS thing figured out. I must say, it's way too easy! I spent way too much time reading about it and bookmarking stuff about it...really once I installed the MT Plugin Directory, it was a snap to install the GetXML plugin. Then in my MT Main Index template, I just pasted in:

<MTGetXML location="http://del.icio.us/rss/agentolivia">
  <MTGetXMLElement name="item">
    <a href="<$MTGetXMLValue name="link">">
    <$MTGetXMLValue name="title"$></a><br />
  </MTGetXMLElement>
</MTGetXML>

...into my sidebar and shazam! the latest updates to my del.icio.us page! As my colleague, Cary would say, "I think this whole Internet thing just might catch on!" ;-)

Now it's time to figure out this whole iPhoto to MT thing. Onward!

Duly Noted

• CSS Panic Guide
• Information Architecture of the Shopping Cart (Argus White Paper)
• Getting Dreamweaver MX Up to Speed with PHP
• Using Amazon Web Services with PHP and SOAP (Part 1)
• Using Amazon Web Services with PHP and SOAP (Part 2)
• You Cannot Pass (road sign inspired by Gandalf's confrontation of the Balrog at the bridge of Khazad-Dûm)
• MusicBrainz (an open source alternative to CDDB)

Google's approach to webmail

Gmail: A Google approach to email

News results for gmail

Tips for Bloggers

~stevenf: Tips For Bloggers

Isn't it interesting how we find Web sites? Here's how I found this entry:

I was going to lunch and wanted to bring something along to read. Decided not to lug around a book and instead opted for a print-out of an article. So I checked my del.icio.us page and printed out this introductory article on PEAR by Harry Fuecks, who wrote the The PHP Anthology that I purchased a little while back and have just started reading on the MAX. Well, in his article, he didn't have instructions for installing PEAR for OSX (and I got to thinking if no one has written any instructions for OSX-ers, then maybe I will figure it out and write it up), so when I got back to my desk after having some yummy enchiladas at the Global Food Court on 2nd, I went back to the aforementioned article and clicked on "an introduction to PEAR" link which brought me to O'Reilly's ONLamp site (ONLamp = all things open source, i.e. Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP, etc.). I scanned the article and didn't really find what I was looking for. Just then, an ad for a book called Running OSX Panther caught my eye. After reading the description of the book and wiping the drool off the side of my mouth, I noticed a cool feature of O'Reilly's Online Catalog in which you select from a drop-down menu which store you would like to buy the book from. ("Ooo! An ad for MacDeveloper's Journal! Cool! Oh wait, I'm not a MacDeveloper...Hmmm, that might be fun.") I tried amazon.com and a couple of others and then I noticed that they had Powell's listed as well. I thought, "cool!" I can walk over to the technical store and grab a used copy! Then, I decided, "no, better to wait until payday" and went back to O'Reilly's site to hunt down PEAR related articles hopefully written by someone running OSX. I looked at this, and searched for this and decided to go to the O'Reilly home page for a clean start. (I perceived that I was a bit lacking in direction. "Lack of direction?" you say? "Oh no, not at all, " shakes head with sly sarcastic smirk on face.) It was there that I noticed a little paragraph describing an interview called, "Dev to Dev: Panic Interview" and upon further examination of said paragraph, noticed that it was an interview with the author of none other than Running Mac OS X, the very book I was only moments ago salavating over!!! Now with my curiousity piqued by more than just the esoteric name of the article, I clicked on the "Dev to Dev" link, thinking to myself, "Cool! Forget PEAR, I'm gonna read this!" Now galvanting down my dynamically-generated pseudo-geek rabbit trail, I read the interview with increased interest and enthusiasm and quickly discovered that Panic was not only a local Portland outfit, but the creators of my favorite FTP program, Transmit!!! What could possibly be the next revelation?! What an exciting lunch break this is turning out to be! (Go ahead, laugh.) So, how did I get to the blog entry referenced at the beginning of this blog entry? (I know, you're just dying to know!) At the end of the "Dev to Dev" article, the author writes in closing about the co-founders, James Duncan Davidson and Steven Frank. Having already discovered James' book that is now on my payday purchases wish list, I decided to check out Steven's blog, ~stevenf, which I immediately gathered was an MT blog (like my own) and scanning the Recent Entries, found this little entry, "Tips For Bloggers, which led me to this and then back again to writing this entry. (Now how do I do that trackback thing again?)

Well, there you have it. A informal procedural knowledge crash course on how to find information (both interesting, useful, and other miscellaneous tidbits) on the wonderful, deployable, sometimes deplorable World Wide Web.

Thank you for your time. And happy Friday.

=)

Just visiting...

Here's a map of the countries I've visited. I cheated on a few - Hong Kong (China) and South Korea were only fuel stops. But we did get off the plane!

Create your own visited country map!

Inspirational Standards

The Weekly Standards

This week's entry was very inspirational. I have consulted Listamatic many times for inspiration and a quick copy and paste, but I hadn't ever looked at the creator's work. The work done for the Australian Museum Online is truly stunning. Kudos to the Web design shop, Max Design and thanks for the proverbial breath of fresh air.

FlashRestore

SubRosaSoft FlashRestore™

The piece of software recovers deleted pics from digital camera memory cards. Hopefully won't have to use this anytime soon, but a good one for the "file drawer." Looks like the OSX release version is a free download, otherwise $24.95. (There's a fully functional demo, however.)

Yummy

del.icio.us

"Delicious is a social bookmarks manager. Using simple bookmarklets, you can add bookmarks to your list and categorize them." (more about del.icio.us here...)

Hat Tip: VJ (Yes, the "Amber" category refers to me!)

O Starry Night

The Best of 2003: Top 10 Astronomy Images

Thanks to a co-worker of mine, Greg, for bringing this article to my attention.

Related:

• Astronomy Picture of the Day
• HubbleSite
• HubbleSOURCE Images and Illustrations (includes instructions for how to get full-res TIFFs)

Birthday Edition

Thanksgiving has come and gone and once again it's December 2nd which is only significant to me because it is my birthday. But a birthday is a good day to be thankful too. So in order to exercise my thankfulness muscle, I think it's only wise to think of a few things for which I am thankful. So...

Today I am thankful for:

• The guy who took my order at La Terraza who thought I was only 23 or 24. That was very kind.
• Our wonderful receptionist who says I remind her of Grace Kelly. That was WAY too kind.
• VJ's gift which was perfect because I was just thinking the other day of how much I wanted a new candle. And it smells so nice.
• My mom and dad and their friends, the Vandeheys, who sang Happy Birthday in 4-part harmony to my voicemail this morning on their way to Seattle.
• A successful e-bay auction, the proceeds of which will support my trip to India in February.
• Internet access at The Apple Store at Washington Square which just opened a few weeks ago and enabled me to check the auction in its final minutes last Saturday. (That was very cool.)
• My 15-month-old niece, Adalie Grace, who I swear nearly said "Auntie Amber" the other day. She is so cute.
• The generosity of my family and friends and their support, whether financial, personal, and/or prayerful of me as I prepare to go to India for a few weeks in February.

This has been a good exercise I think. In the midst of so much preparation and looking forward, I forget the importance and the gift of the present moment and all that has been given and sacrificed for me to live as I am right now. A lot less worrying and a bit more celebration is in order for my life, I think. A bit of renewal. A change, I think...

The John's disciples came and asked him, "How is it that we and the Pharisees fast but your disciples do not fast?"

Jesus answered, "How can the guests of the bridegroom mourn while he is with them? The time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; then they will fast.

No one sews a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch will pull away from the garment, making the tear worse.

Neither do men pour new wine into old wineskins. If they do, the skins will burst, the wine will run out and the wineskins will be ruined. No, they pour new wine into new wineskins, and both are preserved.

—Matthew 9:14-17

Toboggan Jump for the Masses

Well, the holidays are here again. And to pass the time during the winter doldrums and long winter nights, there are many things better and more worthwhile to do than playing Flash games on the computer. But for those who prefer the silly and meaningless, I have a suggestion: The Toboggan Jump Game [flash plugin required, oh yeah].

Enjoy. And mind the flaming ring of fire.

Panther Reviewed

My fellow Mac OS X geeks might enjoy this...Mac OX X 10.3 Panther, by John Siracusa

Enjoy. =)

Multiple IE Versions!

I'm still going through e-mail from last week and what I gem I found: A way to run multiple versions of IE on one PC! Get the scoop and the zipped standalone versions of IE here.

Thanks to Kevin Yank (Sitepoint) for including this in his weekly newsletter!

There are a few bugs that Kevin points out, but I agree that they are minor considering the major hassle it is to test Web pages on multiple versions of IE. In case you're interested, here are the bugs that Kevin points out in his newsletter. (If you want me to forward the issue to you, just leave a comment.)

• the About boxes will display Internet Explorer 6 information in the old About boxes
• using the Favorites menu can cause a system crash
• you need to use File > Open in IE4 because typing a URL in the address bar doesn't seem to work

Grab your standalone copies fast; I'm sure its only a matter of time before Microsoft drops a cease and desist letter on this guy.

Enjoy!

Answers for Oregonians

This could be interesting...

Answerland, Oregon's Live Information Service

A CD-R = (Apparently) Complicated Device - Revealed

I'll be adding this to my morning commute reading list: CD-Recordable FAQ.

At the women's missions brunch on Saturday, my eggs and ham went cold as I was summoned to rectify a situation in which the keynote speaker's PowerPoint presentation, recorded on a CD, was unreadable by the DVD-Rom drive of a Windows 98 Compaq laptop. I was to go to a "nearby" Kinko's and have a new CD burned that would be readable by the laptop. No problem. Glad to do it. Ten blocks later, I arrived at what I realized mid-journey to be the 2nd nearest Kinko's. A manageable situation quickly became desperate when I attempted with puzzling futility to turn on the laptop. The good man behind the Kinko's counter did eventually get it powered up by removing the battery. After rebooting his machine (irony not willing to be left out), another CD was made, this time as an non-rewritable disc. The new CD was successfully read by, what I now considered to be a very "special" laptop. I just pray that this is not the machine I am to take with me to India. (Prayer notwithstanding, actually I think I would refuse to take this machine with me, if given the option.)

Now, of course, I am commissioned to develop a set of guidelines for how to burn a CD that will be readable by the Missions department's laptop so that my errand on Saturday will never again be a necessary one.

Thus, the CD-Recordable FAQ which, among many things, contains an especially useful gem given that I am on a Mac G4 at home and need to know how to make PC-compatible CD-Rs.

Real Simple Syndication Aggregation and Me: Chapter 1

After reading about RSS some time ago, I will finally get my newbie blogging hands on it with the RSS Aggregator, Blagg, using a Movable Type Blaggplug. Not only does this mean fun with RSS, but also fun with OS X and the super-fun Terminal! (No, I'm not a real geek, nor a pseudo-geek, but a level below that, a wanna-be-pseudo-geek: the worst kind!) ::wink::

Standards in Space

Life on Planet Earth:
"On this page you will find a table of color names that are supported by newer versions of both Netscape and Internet Explorer."

Life in Outer Space:
"Note: Color names are not supported by the W3C standards. If you want to write correct CSS you should use the Color HEX values."

Huh. I didn't know that color names weren't supported by W3C standards. Why? Because most, if not all (graphical) browsers support using color names. (I.e. color: black; as an equivalent to color: #000000;)

Another crisis of conscience in the web design world. ::wink::