| Project Wonderful |
[May. 12th, 2008|03:56 pm] |
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The best way to find new comics these days is searching publishers on the Project Wonderful site. |
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| New Toy: BlackBerry Curve |
[May. 12th, 2008|12:42 pm] |
The scrollwheel on my BlackBerry 8700c jammed up a few weeks ago, making the thing rather annoying to use. I've threatened to buy a replacement for about the same period. Friday I finally made good on that threat and purchased a Curve.
( rant regarding idiots buying cellphones )
My first impressions with the Curve are overwhelmingly positive. It's smaller and lighter than the 8700. It has two "convenience keys" which can be used to launch any installed app, as opposed to a single button on the 8800 series. Just like the 8800 series, the phone has an integrated GPS receiver. As is standard with the BlackBerry line, the retail kit includes a nice slip case for the phone, a charger, a usb cable, and the desktop software on cd. What really sold me on the phone was the discovery that it used the same battery as the 8700. Spare batteries are always good. On the down side, the keyboard is a bit smaller and one particular app, HanDBase, doesn't work on the phone. Also, AT&T has decided to load the phone with a dozen different launchers, which are basically apps that launch the browser with a particular URL, all for various AT&T-run web shops. Fortunately the OS on the new generation of phones allows one to create folders, move the offending apps to a folder, and then hide the folder so that even when 'Show All' is enabled, the icons won't litter the screen. Then there's the price. The Curve is $150 cheaper than the 8800. For that difference, I can learn to deal with the smaller keyboard. In fact, I already have. |
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| Finally found a satellite dish |
[Apr. 27th, 2008|09:19 pm] |
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I've been on the lookout for a cheap used satellite dish for some time now. My needs were rather specific... 10' or larger mesh, or an 8' or larger solid-body dish. Today I finally found one. I spent about 2.5 hours cracking bolts older than me. About half of theme sheared off rather than turning, and I'm still less than half-way through. The rest will need to wait until next weekend when I can spend a whole day working the thing. Even then I'll need to borrow a pickup to get it to my house. Worst of all, I'll need to do a little fiberglass repair. |
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| It's 3am... |
[Apr. 22nd, 2008|02:53 am] |
It's 3am and I'm at the colo babysitting a customer.
AS/400 iSeries i5 machines from IBM rarely breakdown, but when they do it's an hours-long affair. They've been at it for 11 hours... |
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| Bums are all liars |
[Apr. 2nd, 2008|01:02 pm] |
So this bum hits me up while at a fast food place the other day. He says, "Man can ya gimme a dolla? I be honest wit ya. I just wanna get me some malt liquor." What could I do? I gave him a dollar.
( Well, that filthy bum was lying. ) |
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| Day 1 Review: ITAC Systems mouse-trak |
[Mar. 4th, 2008|06:29 pm] |
My current trackballs, a Microsoft monstrosity that's actually quite comfortable to use, and a Logitech Trackman Wheel, are starting to wear out in various annoying ways. I've searched high and low for replacements, but it turns out most folks don't care for trackballs. What the market doesn't want, the market doesn't get. Microsoft no longer produces trackballs, and Logitech's remaining trackball isn't all that comfortable. For nearly 20 years I've known about the ITAC Systems MOUSE-TRAK trackball, but never felt it was worth spending $150 to $300 on the thing. Additionally, they don't even have scroll wheels, which are apparently a necessity in this day and age. Despite the fact that the MOUSE-TRAK does not have a scroll wheel and despite the fact that it looks like it was designed in the mid-1980s, I decided to give it try. I was torn between the Professional and Industrial models. While the black case of the Industrial model is rather sexy, it's not worth doubling the price. So I dropped $150 on the ugly gray Professional model.
This morning a FedEx driver showed up with a package. I quickly ripped into the package, unfurled the cord, ripped out my old Trackman Wheel, and plugged in the new toy. As one would expect in this day and age, it worked just like any other standard USB mouse, which means it Just Plain Worked™. At first, the layout of the buttons felt foreign, and with no scroll wheel I was certainly in a panic. Within minutes, the buttons felt natural and weren't a concern. It didn't really take long to unlearn the habits of using a scroll wheel.
After one day of use, I'm certainly considering purchasing another for permanent use at the office. While it's an incredibly ugly chunk of plastic, it's a comfortable and sturdy chunk of plastic. Is it worth the price? It could be. My current trackballs weighed in at $60 and $70 each and wore out in less than five years. |
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| RetroGrade BBS is back |
[Feb. 25th, 2008|06:49 pm] |
The BBS is back. Feel free to telnet in. I should have the dialup line back in service Real Soon Now.
Also, I've killed off TradeWars because the players annoy me and assume the BBS is strictly for their favored game. |
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| Obsolete Skills: Let me show you them |
[Feb. 20th, 2008|11:03 pm] |
A
* Adjusting a television's horizontal and vertical holds
* Adjusting a television's color and hue adjustments?
* Adjusting the dwell angle on the spark distributor of an engine
* Adjusting the levels and song layout for recording to audio tape
* Adjusting the tracking on a VCR
* Adjusting a clock's pendulum
* Aiming C-band satellite dish?
* Aligning the heads on a 9 track tape drive
* Aligning the heads on a five and a quarter inch floppy drive
* ALGOL programming?
* Amiga 500 - Making it boot in PAL mode instead of NTSC?
* Analogue radio listening and tuning in?
* AS 400?
* AT commands for dial-up modems?
* Attaching nose-guard and rails to your skateboard
* Autoexec.bat editing?
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| WIN! |
[Feb. 1st, 2008|09:26 pm] |
So I went to hamfest, and just as I was heading out the door I was stopped by one of the ladies at front, "They're about to draw for a door prize don't leave yet you may win!"
Well, three minutes later I was the proud owner of a Yaesu FT-1820M 2M mobile radio. |
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| New case |
[Jan. 8th, 2008|01:32 am] |
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LIAN LI PC-V2100B Plus II Black rocks. I don't really care what goes in this thing, the case alone is a masterpiece. Seriously, I'm going to buy another one of those and throw a 486 in the thing. |
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| Happy New Year |
[Jan. 1st, 2008|12:00 am] |
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It's 2008. Yay. |
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| no party |
[Dec. 31st, 2007|10:57 pm] |
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So rather than go to the H-burg party I decided to spend half the money I would have otherwise spent on gasoline and buy explodey things instead. I've already worn out my mortar and I have over 20 shells left. |
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| Random |
[Nov. 25th, 2007|05:13 pm] |
- Dual monitors. Why haven't I tried this before? Sure I had to modify my desk to make room for the second display, but who cares?
- Burning Brides! Finally bought the new album thanks to someone mentioning Guitar Hero. Unfortunately I bought it on vinyl. For the record (heh), I don't have a turntable. Fortunately sufficiently decent new turntables are available at relatively low prices... around $200
- I hate Java and have switched back to AOLserver for my various personal web projects.
- ripping mp3s from vinyl will be fun
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| Attention Java webapp developers |
[Nov. 7th, 2007|06:53 pm] |
The whole point of .war files is so that you have a simple deployable file that will work on any servlet container that implements the spec (i.e. all of them). The whole point of the servlet spec is so that an application written to the spec will work on any servlet container. One should not be required to track down weird dependencies nor should it be impossible to run a given servlet on an unbundled install of the same version of the servlet container included with the app tarball without hours of headaches. Sure, it's one thing to require a little minor configuration for a database, and it's certainly not outside of reason to require the person deploying the app to have the database pre-loaded with the schema and a base set of data. Something is completely broken if the poor sap that's deploying the application has to manually pre-configure the database, track down the jdbc driver for the database, oh and don't forget grab the persistence layer .jar files from elsewhere, downgrade from Java 6 to Java 5 or 1.3 (but not 1.4) simply because the author wrote the app The Wrong Way, and other horrors that shall remain unspoken.
Most apps are completely broken. Pretty much every single turnkey Java CMS blows goats if it even runs at all outside of the developer's highly mangled setup. Every other Java "CMS" is a framework. In other words, the authors are incapable of producing even a broken turnkey app.
The entire Java world is stuck on frameworks. There are actually frameworks that run on top of frameworks that run on top of frameworks. From what I've seen, apps built on frameworks, which are supposed to make writing apps simpler and faster, have more lines of code than those that were written directly on top of the HttpServlet class. When some application proudly proclaims, "AppFoo is designed using the DesignPattern paradigm on top of the Broken framework with persistence provided by SomethingDefective and implements SomeJavaStandard" it's best to run away. It's a clear sign the author concentrated on buzzword compliance rather than implementing Useful Features (read: something that works).
One of the few webapps I've touched that actually works without any pain is CentricCRM. It is a perfect example of how the Java Servlet platform should work. Even building and deploying from source was painless! Any minor misconfiguration during the build process would result in an error that explicitly stated what needs to be changed. The .war file Just Plain Worked.
My theory is that the broken "turnkey" software and frameworks are created to give Java developers and consultants jobs. |
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| grumble |
[Nov. 4th, 2007|07:58 pm] |
Tonight's photographic failure brought to you by the letters D, E, and W.
Fun fun. Knowing my luck, the innards of the camera will probably turn to rust. |
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| another star trails shot |
[Nov. 4th, 2007|07:20 pm] |
| [ | Current Music |
| | N32.61942 W90.96497 | ] |
I'm once again parked on the side of a dirt road making a star trails shot. I've had to fend off a horde of blood sucking insects not to mention a few bees. Fortunately the bugs disappeared as the temperatures has plunged. Either that or the bat that just buzzed by had something to do with it.
While waiting on the long exposure, I've gotten in quite a bit of star gazing. Saw quite a few satellites and random wobbly space junk but only one meteor. Saw that comet that recently brightened by about 400,000 times.
It's getting a bit too cold to be outside right now so I think I'll go ahead and head back to the house. |
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| Half-Life 2 |
[Oct. 26th, 2007|07:18 pm] |
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Anybody want Half-Life 2 for free? |
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| Random thought |
[Oct. 3rd, 2007|12:36 am] |
An impulsive decision that causes a permanent change to your body, life or personal relationships is not the same as commitment.
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| AWA Photos |
[Sep. 27th, 2007|09:59 pm] |
Processed three rolls of film tonight. After looking at the final roll I noticed quite a few missing shots. Hopefully they are on the mystery roll of Plus-X. It's a bit late to work another roll tonight so that will happen tomorrow or over the weekend. I'm ready to rip into the new box of paper, so prints are inevitable. Scans will be available over on flickr as well as a tiny selection of digital shots. |
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| Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah |
[Sep. 27th, 2007|06:50 pm] |
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Both of my dvd players are broken. The newest one died first. It randomly blinked out one night and has yet to work since that time. The other one toggles power at unexpected times. Either that or someone is standing outside my house with a remote and randomly toggling power on the beast. |
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