Archive for the ‘general’ Category
And if any of you using WP are sick of how plain the admin interface is, just go here. Oh heavens, what an improvement.
Thanks Dar.
Note: default permissions in the zipfile are whacked (or were for me). chmod -R 644 * in the directory it unzips into, and its all good.
Finally got my laptop working at home. And synergy is in full effect. If you haven’t yet found the beautiful thing that is Synergy, and you use more than one computer on any desk you work or play at, you need to stop what you’re doing, follow that link, and go get it. Clients for Mac, Unix and Windows. Trust me, you need this. Really.
So upon leaving SUN, the beginning of the end of the stock options I received while working there happens. For those who don’t know … stock options work in four phases… grant, vest, purchase and expire. An option is granted on a particular date, at a particular price, on a particular vesting schedule, and will expire at a particular time. Read more
So my wife’s Mom is coming to visit later today, and staying for a week. This sort of thing always is preceeded by a tremendous effort to clean the house and make things reasonably presentable. Try to mix that in with trying to get enough sleep and still spending time with the other usual weekly activities, and you invariably fall short on something. In this case, sleep. Read more
With the idea of another machine incoming and a certain desire to remain firmly rooted in sanity, I decided to redo the wiring underneath my desk. In the past, say, 4 years, it achieved a certain Zen-like state of rat’s nest-edness. To unravel it would require the patience of a monk. Or, at least the flavor of one.
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So the laptop has registered ‘Order Received’ status on the order status page since I ordered it. That just isn’t going to cut it. Ideally, a webcam hovered over the workbench tracking the minutia of the Singaporean factory worker would be good. Otherwise, I’d like updates like “Processor fitted into slot” or “Assembler currently on coffee break”, updated every 10 minutes or so. Don’t they understand that I refresh that page every 30 seconds? Sheesh.
<update>
Sent apple an email. Seems to me I should have seen some progress on the order in the time since I submitted it.
</update>
Can’t beat it with a stick
So I was recently down in the Data Center, doing my usual overnight equipment setup, configuration, cable making or whatever. I had received a set of Sennheiser MX 500 earbud style headphones for Christmas, and I was listening to my iPod with them. Their cord length is just about perfect, maybe a touch too short, but generally, if I run them down my back, it keeps the wires from getting in my way, and I keep my front clear and can still listen to my tunes. Continued use, though, showed me that my ears just aren’t shaped real well to hold onto the buds very well, and over time, they need to be fidgeted with to get them to stay in, and even then, I’m not getting what I would consider well focused, directed sound.
So in doing a bit more research, the next best option seemed to be neckband style headphones. Having heard good things about Sennheiser, and having experienced the quality of the sound on the earbuds, I figured I’d try their product in this line, the PMX 60. The basic specs and a quick click on the ‘Technical Data’ link will show some pretty impressive figures for sound clarity and quality. But you know… ultimately, I need to listen to them. I want it loud, with very wide range songs, and I want it directed well along the ‘sound path’ in my ears. I just received them, and have since listened to them on a variety of sources, from the iPod to my computer to the output from the stereo/tv receiver.
Holy crap are these things nice. The sound clarity is excellent. Tones are rich and deep, never tinny and high are nice and crisp. Tone definition along the range is clear and distinct with no muddling up or smoothing along any part of the range. Just damn nice.
Another thing occurs to me too with these. I always assumed that the wraparound neckband style phones would have some sort of adjustment that would accomodate people of different head/neck sizes. They don’t. But you know something? They fit perfectly. Is this some strange new universal constant? Is the distance from the back of the neck to the top of the ears the same for every person on the planet? Color me befuddled, but grateful.
In short, I’m completely sold on Sennheiser products. These are just another in a very strong line of quality audio products, and I’d recommend them to anyone who tolerates me long enough to ask.
[xrr rating=9/10]
So, ever since I’ve put this up in this format, I’ve been trying to control the comment SPAM that seems to plague blogs on a periodic basis. If you’re not familiar with this concept, count yourself among the fortunate. My first effort was simply to force that all comments would require moderation. This was good, and it did help, but it ultimately doesn’t solve the problem. It just means I have to go in and ‘clean up’ the comment moderation queue every once in awhile of all the crap in there.
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Moved to WordPress 1.5, and with the exception of having to do a little bit of reworking of my theme, it was nice and clean. Very impressive team, good job! I’m going to start looking through the plugins again when I get a chance, and see if there’s anything new I want to implement. In the meantime, thanks again for making a great product that makes keeping my site(s) up to date.
I wanted to try and introduce the Style Switcher into my site to give people some options on how to display things. I realized fairly quickly that, at least in the case of that particular style switcher mod, that I would have needed to have introduced that concept before I started making significant changes to the index.php file or css file to achieve the current effect.
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There is nothing I hate more in the world than having to reinstall my computer. I mean, there’s a history you develop as you install applications, and leave all the crap and cruft on the drive from a year plus of usage. But this time, I didn’t have a choice. Fortunately, I segment my system drive from the rest of my data, so I don’t lose anything. But that doesn’t mean I’m spared the pain of reinstalling the 100+ applications and utilities I either actively or semi-actively use. And that isn’t even including games. BAH.
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The years have not been kind. No … I need to rephrase that. I have not been kind to myself over the years. Yeah, thats better. In my advanced age of 34 (har), I am now starting to feel all the deliterious effects of the abuses of my youth, and the continued effects of my overall sloth.
And you know, its the stupid little things that remind you of it, that something’s not right, or that something needs to be fixed. Vaulting up 15 steps, and being winded. Bending over to tie your shoes and feeling uncomfortable because your gut is in the way. An afternoon spent walking around in a local shopping district leaves you tired, cranky and sore. Oh, not to mention the obvious of not having clothes fitting that used to, etc.
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So now we approach another end of year, and lots of people get all reflective and try and do life analysis, figure out where to try and improve and all that. I still assert, and pretty much always have, that every single day is cause for celebration. I realize that based on particular religious practice, or perhaps to celebrate particular a particular person or some country’s achievement. All well and good, I’m down with that.
To me, though … I wake up every day pretty damn thankful that I’m still breathing. I don’t need any more cause than that to celebrate a day. Similarly, I don’t need any other reason to be reflective and try to find ways to improve my life and health.
Happy Holidays and New Year to you and yours.
Peace.
As with just about any other blog out there, I did recently get hit by the elements out there that would seek to make maintaining a site like this one a more difficult, high maintenance process. Fortunately, wordpress has some excellent facilities for dealing with comments spammers.
I found it an interesting observation that the spammers are not at all seeking click throughs to the sites they are advertising. Instead, they’re simply seeking to have the search engines find as many links to their site as they can, which in turn improves their rankings in searches for things. I suppose any system can be subverted if you throw enough assholes at it.
