Lewies Blogs

ICQ Lost?

2011-09-03T01:03:00.001-04:00

I've had ICQ for a looooong time. Back in the day, it was owned by a company in Israel. My number is so low, it's only six digits 364308. I even met my wife through ICQ. The problem today is that I don't know my password, and any attempt to use the forgot password feature on the site says - nope, you can't do it with your account. So now I'm at a loss. How the heck to I get my account back?

WordPress Timezones

2005-10-02T22:26:00.000-04:00

Dates appear to be working correctly in my test environment. There are two steps that I needed to take. The first was to make sure that dates are sent as UTC format over the XML-RPC API. The second step was a handy little Time Zone plugin. Once activated, I entered EST5EDT for my Time zone. I was also able to enter America/New_York and it handled it the same way.

I have been a little concerned over how I would be able to link posts from my blogspot blog over to the new blog. I appended the post identification in a comment in each post. This way, I can send a link over to the search results and search for that tag. Here is an example of one of the tags:

tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8179070.post-112817586244792334

And this is the URL that I would use:

http://www.lewismoten.com/index.php?s=post-112817586244792334

One other thing that I have been working on is giving everyone credit for there posts. Both my wife and I post to my blogspot blog. She makes guest appearances every now and then, so I created two additional accounts besides the administrative account. I had to promote the levels of our accounts up to at least 5 before I would be able to post via XML-RPC.

I also consolidated my category to list 11 items:

Hobbies

Blogging
Computers
Entertainment
Programming

Life

Communications
Employment
Finances
Friends and Family

Miscellaneous

Miscellaneous is the default category here. If a post doesn't fit anywhere else, it goes there.

The last few things on my list of things to do is to muck around with comments and the template. Once that is ready, I'm in business to go public. Comments are going to be tricky since I can't find anything in the XML-RPC file to post them. I may have to do a little programming here, as I can't connect directly to the MySQL database either.

Tags: WordPress, XML-RPC, Exporting, Categories, Time zones, Dates

Turn brains to mush in 3 easy steps

2005-10-02T19:49:00.000-04:00

After getting up late today, my mother in law walks into the door with the kids. My nephew takes off and for the next three hours I am entertaining my niece. The Atari Flashback 2 is getting a little boring for her and so we moved on to the Sony Playstation 2.

We played Katamari Damacy, Spyro the Dragon, Spyro - Year of the Dragon, and Spyro - Enter the Dragonfly. She is pretty young so most of the time she was learning how to move around. Her favorite seemed to be Spyro - Enter the Dragon. She stayed in the main world frying sheep for about an hour.

With the simple game play, your brain just slowly turns to mush. Sometimes I just want to take control and play the game for her the way that the game is supposed to be played. I hold myself back from doing it because she is having fun anyway.

I taught her how to take CD's and DVD's out of the cases, how to hold them, and how to load them into the Sony Playstation 2. Her fingers got on the bottom of one and we got a message asking us to put in an authentic Sony PS1 or Sony PS2 disc. I took the disc out and rubbed my shirt on the surface. It was running fine after that.

Most of my games are not kid-safe, so I may have to look into some cheap games that will entertain her when she visits.

Tags: Video Games, Spyro, Sony Playstation, PS2, Atari, Family, Katamari, Atari Flashback

Exporting to WordPress

2005-10-02T02:11:00.000-04:00

Since I had worked on a project involving the Atom API, I already have all of the data on my local computer from my blogger.com account. WordPress provides a few standard APIs over XML-RPC. This is great because I also have some code laying around to interface with it.

I've gotten all of my posts exported into a test environment at home. I have been noticing that the dates are not always rite. I've also had problems navigating pages in the month view of the archives. It keeps wanting to go to the main index page rather then the month archive.

I spent most of today working on categories. Since I had tagged most of my posts with Technorati tags, I was able to use them to determine what category the post should go in. I got a little carried away with the categories and now I'm trying to consolidate them into more generic categories to compact the list.

Tags: WordPress, Atom API, XML-RPC, Exporting, Categories

WordPress Troubleshooting

2005-10-01T09:52:00.000-04:00

I'm digging more and more into WordPress. Today I changed my permalink structure to use the mod_rewrite functionality. This helps me keep the same structure of my URLs that appear on blogger. As soon as I saved my changes, my entire site gave me errors.

I downloaded the source code for options-permalink.php in the administration folder and saw that it was writing to the .htaccess file. I can't see this file in my WS_FTP client, so I had to go to the command line of DOS and type the simple acronym "FTP".

ftp] open
To lewismoten.com
Connected to lewismoten.com.
220 ProFTPD FTP Server ready.
User (lewismoten.com:(none)): xxxxx
331 Password required for xxxxx.
Password:
230 User xxxxx logged in.
ftp] cd /var/www/html
250 CWD command successful
ftp] recv
Remote file .htaccess
Local file c:\htaccess.txt
200 PORT command successful
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for .htaccess (3660 bytes)
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 3704 bytes received in 0.00Seconds 3704000.00Kbytes/sec.
ftp] send
Local file c:\htaccess.txt
Remote file .htaccess
200 PORT command successful
150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for .htaccess
226 Transfer complete.
ftp: 3706 bytes sent in 0.00Seconds 3706000.00Kbytes/sec.
ftp] bye
221 Goodbye.

So looking at that .htaccess file, I saw that WordPress changed my original text from "ErrorDocument 404 /404.php" to "ErrorDOcument 404 /404.php# BEGIN WordPress". There was a lot of stuff that it added regarding the RewriteEngine, but my concern was focused on that first line.

It changed the "o" in document to upper-case, and appended a comment rite off of the end of my URL. I separated it into two lines and restored the ErrorDocument keyword back to its original state. After uploading the file back onto the site, everything worked fine.

Tags: WordPress, .htaccess, FTP, mod_rewrite, Troubleshooting

Music to my ears

2005-10-01T02:16:00.000-04:00

Ever since I got my free iPod, I've been rating all of the songs that I have imported from my CD's. I currently have 3291 songs in my library, so you can imagine why it took me so long.

Following is a list of 325 songs that I gave my highest rating on. I built the list using an XSL stylesheet on an exported XML playlist. More details can be found on the following article Convert your iTunes Library XML into HTML.

Name	Artist	Album	Genre
The Perfect Drug	Nine Inch Nails	Lost Highway	Soundtrack
I Put A Spell On You	Marilyn Manson	Lost Highway	Soundtrack
Technologic	Daft Punk	Human After All	Electronic
Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?	Moby	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Groove Therapy	Universal	LTJ Bukem Presents Logical Progression	Electronica & Dance
Born Slippy (NUXX)	Underworld	Y2K - Beat the Clock	Electronic
Something Like a Mama	Underworld	Beaucoup Fish	Electronic
Jumbo	Underworld	Beaucoup Fish	Electronic
Phosphorella	Trance to the Sun	Venomous Eve	Rock
Ballet - Dancer	Sven Väth	The Harlequin - The Robot and the Ballet-dancer	Electronica & Dance
Parallel Life	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Pontus	Siddal	Kindred Spirits	Rock
So Long	Seb & Lo-tec	LTJ Bukem Presents Logical Progression	Electronica & Dance
Wild	Poe	Haunted	Rock
Ultraworld Probe Six - Perpetual Dawn	The Orb	The Orb's Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld	Electronic
High Energy Protons (Orion Mix)	Juno Reactor	Bible of Dreams	Dance
Children Of The Night	Juno Reactor	Bible of Dreams	Dance
Komit	Juno Reactor	Bible of Dreams	Dance
Conga Fury	Juno Reactor	Bible of Dreams	Dance
Jardin De Cecile	Juno Reactor	Bible of Dreams	Dance
Airtight Remix	Funky Technicians	LTJ Bukem Presents Logical Progression	Electronica & Dance
Back to the rivers of belief	Enigma	MCMXC a.D.	Native American
Yulunga	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Indus	Dead Can Dance	Spiritchaser	Gothic
Dead Man Walking	David Bowie	EART HL I NG	Rock
Busy Child	The Crystal Method	Y2K - Beat the Clock	Electronic
To Die For	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Drippy	Banco De Gaia	Pi Soundtrack	Dance
Tha	Aphex Twin	Selected Ambient Works 85-92	Ambient
Gentle People / Journey (Aphex Twin Care Mix)	Aphex Twin	26 Mixes for Cash	Electronic
The Iron Helix	Xorcist	The Disease of Lady Madeline	Gothic
Track09		Ambient Mix 2	Ambient
Ever After	Underflowers	Underflowers	Rock
Kleine Schwester (Scharfer Zahn remake)	Umbra et Imago	Call On The Dark	Gothic
Falling in Love	Ultracherry Violet	Kindred Spirits	Rock
With or Without You	U2	The Joshua Tree	Rock
I Still haven't Found What I'm Looking For	U2	The Joshua Tree	Rock
Where the Streets Have No Name	U2	The Joshua Tree	Rock
Overcome	Tricky	The Official Movie Soundtrack Strange Days	Electronic
Admire	This Ascension	Kindred Spirits	Rock
Burning Down the House	Talking Heads	Stop Making Sense	Pop
Nas Ne Dogoniat	t.A.T.u.	200 KMpH In The Wrong Lane	Pop
Not Gonna Get Us	t.A.T.u.	200 KMpH In The Wrong Lane	Pop
Clown	Switchblade Symphony	Serpentine Gallery	Gothic Rock
Bad Trash	Switchblade Symphony	Serpentine Gallery	Gothic Rock
Clown	Switchblade Symphony	Kindred Spirits	Rock
Soldiers	Switchblade Symphony	Bread and Jam for Frances	Rock
Wallflower	Switchblade Symphony	Gothic Rock	Gothic Rock
Deus	The Sugarcubes	The Great Crossover Potential	Rock
Birthday	The Sugarcubes	The Great Crossover Potential	Rock
This Charm	Strange Boutique	Kindred Spirits	Rock
Subspace Radio Signals	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Heavensairportcoffeeshoprestaurant	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Sonne Mond und Sterne	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Timequakes	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Behind the Sun	The Starseeds	Parallel Life	Ambient
Slower than You Think	Sparrow Orange	Hands and Knees Music	Ambient
Liquid Shy	Sparrow Orange	Hands and Knees Music	Ambient
I Remember It All	Sparrow Orange	Hands and Knees Music	Ambient
time baby ii		The Crow	Soundtrack
dead souls	soundtrack	the crow	Rock
burn	soundtrack	the crow	Rock
Iris	Goo Goo Dolls	City Of Angels	Soundtrack
If God Will Send His Angels	U2	City Of Angels	Soundtrack
Soma	Smashing Pumpkins	Siamese Dream	Other
Cherub Rock	Smashing Pumpkins	Siamese Dream	Other
Farewell And Goodnight	Smashing Pumpkins	Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (Twilight To Starlight)	Rock
By Starlight	Smashing Pumpkins	Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (Twilight To Starlight)	Rock
Beautiful	Smashing Pumpkins	Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (Twilight To Starlight)	Rock
We Only Come Out At Night	Smashing Pumpkins	Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (Twilight To Starlight)	Rock
1979	Smashing Pumpkins	Mellon Collie And The Infinite Sadness (Twilight To Starlight)	Rock
Candle	Skinny Puppy	The Process	Rock
Rivers	Skinny Puppy	Rabies	Industrial
Riverz End	Skinny Puppy	Last Rights	Industrial
Deadlines	Skinny Puppy	Brap: Back and Forth	Rock
Double Cross	Skinny Puppy	Brap: Back and Forth	Rock
Flesh In My Veins (feat. Peter Field)	Silke Bischoff	Call On The Dark	Gothic
The Passion of Lovers	The Shroud	The Passion of Covers: A Tribute to Bauhaus	Gothic Rock
Witness	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
Adia	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
Sweet Surrender	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
I Love You	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
Building A Mystery	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
Walk This Way	Run DMC	Entertainment Weekly Greatest Hits Of 1986	Rock/Pop
Godstar 94	Psychic Television	Time's Up (Best OV Psychic TV)	Psychedelic
Just Like Arcadia	Psychic Television	Time's Up (Best OV Psychic TV)	Psychedelic
Lady Maybe (Dub Me Maybe Mix)	Psychic Television	Cold Blue Torch	Psychedelic
Out of Space	The Prodigy	Y2K - Beat the Clock	Electronic
Hello	Poe	Hello	Gothic
Hey Pretty	Poe	Haunted	Rock
Not A Virgin	Poe	Haunted	Rock
Walk The Walk	Poe	Haunted	Rock
Control	Poe	Haunted	Rock
Haunted	Poe	Haunted	Rock
I Grieve	Peter Gabriel	City Of Angels	Soundtrack
Coming Up Roses	Owsley	Brain Waves	Alternative
Little Fluffy Clouds (Live From Washington DC '97)	The Orb	U.F.Off: The Best Of The Orb	Electronic
earth orbit one - little fluffy clouds	The Orb	The Orb's Adventures Beyond The Ultraworld	Electronic
Bedouin	The Orb	Orblivion	Electronic
I'm not in love	Olive	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Dread Rock	Oakenfold	The Matrix Reloaded	Soundtrack
Kick It (dr. know mix)	Nitzer Ebb	Call On The Dark	Gothic
Ringfinger	Nine Inch Nails	Pretty Hate Machine (Halo Two)	Industrial
Down In It	Nine Inch Nails	Pretty Hate Machine (Halo Two)	Industrial
Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad?	Moby	Play	Electronic
When It's Cold I'd Like to Die	Moby	Everything is Wrong	Club
Whispers	Mistle Thrush	Kindred Spirits	Rock
A Tout Le Monde	Megadeth	Youthanasia	Hard Rock & Metal
Angel	Massive Attack	Pi Soundtrack	Soundtrack
Dissolved Girl	Massive Attack	Mezzanine	Trip-Hop
Angel	Massive Attack	Mezzanine	Trip-Hop
I Put A Spell On You	Marilyn Manson	Smells Like Children	Industrial
The last day on earth	Marilyn Manson	Mechanical Animals	Industrial
Mechanical animals	Marilyn Manson	Mechanical Animals	Industrial
This Is The New Shit	Marilyn Manson	The Matrix Reloaded	Soundtrack
This life	Mandalay	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Eccentricity	Magenta	The Unquiet Grave	Gothic
Shanti/Ashtangi	Madonna	Ray Of Light	Pop
Ray Of Light	Madonna	Ray Of Light	Pop
Drowned World/Substitute For Love	Madonna	Ray Of Light	Pop
Vogue	Madonna	Dick Tracy- I'm Breathless	Soundtrack
Time stood still	Madonna	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
American pie	Madonna	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Kiss (Ra mix)	London After Midnight	Psycho Magnet	Darkwave
Kiss	London After Midnight	Psycho Magnet	Darkwave
The Carnival Is Over	Leather Strip	The Carnival Within	Gothic Rock
Dark Entries	Kill Switch...Klick	The Passion of Covers: A Tribute to Bauhaus	Gothic Rock
Soloution	Ils & Solo	Logical Progression	Electronica & Dance
In Power We Entrust The Love Advocated	Ikon	The Carnival Within	Gothic Rock
Blithe Spirit	The Garden	Kindred Spirits	Rock
Liquid Separation	Front Line Assembly	Millennium	Industrial
Motion	Front 242	06:21:03:11 Up Evil	Rock
Crushed (Obscene)	Front 242	05:22:09:12 Off	Industrial
Animal (Zoo)	Front 242	05:22:09:12 Off	Industrial
Crushed	Front 242	05:22:09:12 Off	Industrial
Modern Angel	Front 242	05:22:09:12 Off	Industrial
Everlong	Foo Fighters	The Colour And The Shape	Alternative
February Stars	Foo Fighters	The Colour And The Shape	Alternative
My Hero	Foo Fighters	The Colour And The Shape	Alternative
Monkey Wrench	Foo Fighters	The Colour And The Shape	Alternative
Cars	Fear Factory	Obsolete	Heavy Metal
Sparks	Faith and the Muse	The Disease of Lady Madeline	Gothic
Annwyn, Beneath The Waves	Faith and The Muse	Call On The Dark	Gothic
Anywhere Is	Enya	The Memory of Trees	New Age
Afer Ventus	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Evacuee	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Angeles	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Caribbean Blue	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Return To Innocence	Enigma	The CROSS Of Changes	Rock
Prism Of Life	Enigma	Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!	Native American
The Child In Us	Enigma	Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!	Native American
Beyond The Invisible	Enigma	Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!	Native American
Morphing Thru Time	Enigma	Le Roi Est Mort, Vive Le Roi!	Native American
Stan > Featuring Dido	Eminem	The Marshall Mathers LP	Rap
My Dad's Gone Crazy (ft. Hailie Jade)	Eminem	The Eminem Show	Rap
Apparition Sky	Emeralde Feare	The Unquiet Grave	Gothic
Terror Couple Kill Colonel	Eleven Shadows	The Passion of Covers: A Tribute to Bauhaus	Gothic Rock
Bela Lugosi's Dead	The Electric Hellfire Club	The Passion of Covers: A Tribute to Bauhaus	Gothic Rock
Turn Up The Music	Dr. Baker	Trance In Your Mind	Dance
Anywhere out of this world	Deep Red	The Carnival Within	Gothic Rock
Forest Hymn	Deep Forest	Deep Forest	New Age
White Whisper	Deep Forest	Deep Forest	New Age
Boheme	Deep Forest	Boheme	Electronic
Twosome	Deep Forest	Boheme	Electronic
Marta's Song	Deep Forest	Boheme	Electronic
Cantara	Dead Can Dance	Within the Realm of a Dying Sun	Gothic
Xavier	Dead Can Dance	Within the Realm of a Dying Sun	Gothic
In the Wake of Adversity	Dead Can Dance	Within the Realm of a Dying Sun	Gothic
Anywhere Out of the World	Dead Can Dance	Within the Realm of a Dying Sun	Gothic
Don't Fade Away	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Sanvean	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Song Of The Sibyl	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Cantara	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
American Dreaming	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Rakim	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Ullyses	Dead Can Dance	The Serpent's Egg	Gothic
In The Kingdom Of The Blind The One-eyed Are Kings	Dead Can Dance	The Serpent's Egg	Gothic
Severance	Dead Can Dance	The Serpent's Egg	Gothic
Avatar	Dead Can Dance	Spleen and Ideal	Gothic
Advent	Dead Can Dance	Spleen and Ideal	Gothic
Enigma of the Absolute	Dead Can Dance	Spleen and Ideal	Gothic
Song of the Nile	Dead Can Dance	Spiritchaser	Gothic
Song of the Dispossessed	Dead Can Dance	Spiritchaser	Gothic
The Carnival Is Over	Dead Can Dance	Into The Labyrinth	Gothic
The Ubiquitous Mr Lovegrove	Dead Can Dance	Into The Labyrinth	Gothic
The Arcane	Dead Can Dance	Dead Can Dance	Gothic
In Power We Entrust the Love Advocated	Dead Can Dance	Dead Can Dance	Gothic
East of Eden	Dead Can Dance	Dead Can Dance	Gothic
Fortune	Dead Can Dance	Dead Can Dance	Gothic
Black Sun	Dead Can Dance	Aion	Gothic
Fortune Presents Gifts Not According to the Book	Dead Can Dance	Aion	Gothic
In the Kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed are Kings	Dead Can Dance	A Passage in Time	Gothic
Anywhere out of the World	Dead Can Dance	A Passage in Time	Gothic
Enigma of the Absolute	Dead Can Dance	A Passage in Time	Gothic
Ullyses	Dead Can Dance	A Passage in Time	Gothic
The Hearts Filthy Lesson	David Bowie	Outside	Rock
As the World Falls Down	David Bowie	Labyrinth	Soundtrack
Survive	David Bowie	Hours	Rock
Thursday's Child	David Bowie	Hours	Rock
Battle For Britain (The Letter)	David Bowie	EART HL I NG	Rock
Little Wonder	David Bowie	EART HL I NG	Rock
Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger	Daft Punk	Discovery	Electronic
One More Time	Daft Punk	Discovery	Electronic
Adrenaline	The Curtain Society	Kindred Spirits	Rock
Treasure	The Cure	Wild Mood Swings	Alternative
Return	The Cure	Wild Mood Swings	Alternative
Mint Car	The Cure	Wild Mood Swings	Alternative
Strange Attraction	The Cure	Wild Mood Swings	Alternative
Other Voices	The Cure	Staring At The Sea (The Singles)	Rock/Pop
One More Time	The Cure	Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me	Rock/Pop
Just Like Heaven	The Cure	Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me	Rock/Pop
The Kiss	The Cure	Kiss Me, Kiss Me, Kiss Me	Rock/Pop
Closedown	The Cure	Disintegration	Gothic
Plainsong	The Cure	Disintegration	Gothic
Angel Of Night	Crayon Death	Johns Dad	Heavy Metal
Gridlock	Crayon Death	Johns Dad	Heavy Metal
We Got the Gun	Clint Mansell	Pi Soundtrack	Soundtrack
Setting Sun (Radio Edit)	The Chemical Brothers	Setting Sun	Techno
Setting Sun (Full Length Version)	The Chemical Brothers	Setting Sun	Techno
If Only	Born for Bliss	Call On The Dark	Gothic
All We Ever Wanted Was Everything	Blade Fetish	The Passion of Covers: A Tribute to Bauhaus	Gothic Rock
How Can You Forget Love?	Black Tape For A Blue Girl	A Chaos Of Desire	Gothic
Pandora's Box	Black Tape For A Blue Girl	A Chaos Of Desire	Gothic
New World	Björk	Selmasongs	Soundtrack
I've Seen It All	Björk	Selmasongs	Soundtrack
Possibly Maybe	Björk	Post	Rock
Enjoy	Björk	Post	Rock
Hyper-ballad	Björk	Post	Rock
Army Of Me	Björk	Post	Rock
All Is Full Of Love	Björk	Homogenic	Electronic
Bachelorette	Björk	Homogenic	Electronic
Jóga	Björk	Homogenic	Electronic
Hunter	Björk	Homogenic	Electronic
Violet	The Birthday Massacre	Violet	Gothic Rock
The Dream	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Broken	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Video Kid	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Under The Stairs	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Promise Me	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Horror Show	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
Happy Birthday	The Birthday Massacre	Nothing And Nowhere	Gothic Rock
California	April's Motel Room	Black 14	Alternative
Windowlicker	Aphex Twin	Windowlicker	Electronic
Cliffs	Aphex Twin	Selected Ambient Works	Ambient
Heliosphan	Aphex Twin	Selected Ambient Works	Ambient
Cailin na Gruaige B ine	Aoife Ni Fhearraigh	Aoife	Folklore
Sexy Boy	Air	Moon Safari	New Age
Inn	Underflowers	Underflowers	Rock
The Passportal	Team Sleep	The Matrix Reloaded	Soundtrack
Athair as Neamh	The Taliesin Orchestra - Charles Sayre, conductor	Orinoco Flow - The Music of Enya	New Age
Ya Soshla S Uma	t.A.T.u.	200 KMpH In The Wrong Lane	Pop
All The Things She Said	t.A.T.u.	200 KMpH In The Wrong Lane	Pop
Gutter Glitter	Switchblade Symphony	Serpentine Gallery	Gothic Rock
Rus'ti-ca'tion	Sparrow Orange	Hands and Knees Music	Ambient
after the flesh	soundtrack	the crow	Rock
Angel	Sarah McLachlan	City Of Angels	Soundtrack
Disarm	Smashing Pumpkins	Siamese Dream	Other
Cult	Skinny Puppy	The Process	Rock
Angel	Sarah McLachlan	Surfacing	Rock
Good Vibrations (7" Version)	Psychic Television	Time's Up (Best OV Psychic TV)	Psychedelic
Godstar (7" Mix)	Psychic Television	Time's Up (Best OV Psychic TV)	Psychedelic
Angry Johnny	Poe	Hello	Gothic
Toxygene (Edit)	Orb	Y2K - Beat the Clock	Electronic
Porcelain	Moby	Play	Electronic
Boom Boom BA	Metisse	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Bongo Bong	Manu Chao	The Next Best Thing	Soundtrack
Imagine	John Lennon	The John Lennon Collection	Rock
Athair Ar Nearmh	Enya	The Memory of Trees	New Age
I Want Tomorrow	Enya	The Celts	New Age
Marble Halls	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Shepherd Moons	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Marble Halls	Enya	Paint The Sky With Stars (The Best Of )	New Age
Shepherd Moons	Enya	Paint The Sky With Stars (The Best Of )	New Age
Opening Titles Including Underground	David Bowie	Labyrinth	Soundtrack
Close To Me	The Cure	Staring At The Sea (The Singles)	Rock/Pop
In-Between Days	The Cure	Staring At The Sea (The Singles)	Rock/Pop
2 Pi r	Clint Mansell	Pi Soundtrack	Soundtrack
Spoon	Cibo Matto	Brain Waves	Rock
Toxic	Britney Spears	In The Zone	Pop
Jamming	Bob Marley & The Wailers	Exodus	Reggae
The Modern Things	Björk	Post	Rock
Human Behaviour	Björk	Debut	Rock
Wishful Thinking	Underflowers	Underflowers	Rock
Today	Smashing Pumpkins	Siamese Dream	Other
Acid F*cker	Silent Breed	Banging the Box	House
Elysium	Hans Zimmer & Lisa Gerrard	Gladiator	Soundtrack
Animal (Guide)	Front 242	05:22:09:12 Off	Industrial
Tea-House Moon [Instrumental]	Enya	The Memory of Trees	New Age
Book Of Days	Enya	Shepherd Moons	New Age
Break On Through	Doors	The Best of the Doors	Psychedelic
I Can See Now	Dead Can Dance	Toward The Within	Gothic
Chains Of Color	Black Tape For A Blue Girl	A Chaos Of Desire	Gothic
Unravel	Björk	Homogenic	Electronic
Flim	Aphex Twin	Come To Daddy	Industrial
Ainnir Dheas na gCiaghfholt Donn	Aoife Ni Fhearraigh	Aoife	Folklore
Mephisto Walz	Alle In Ashe	Gothic Rock	Gothic Rock
Ariadne	Dead Can Dance	Into The Labyrinth	Gothic
Pi r Squared	Clint Mansell	Pi Soundtrack	Soundtrack
You've Been Flirting Again	Björk	Post	Rock
Breathe	Telepopmusik	Genetic World	Electronic
Breathe (Extended Mix)	Telepopmusik	Genetic World	Electronic
Smile	Telepopmusik	Genetic World	Electronic
Don't Look Back	Telepopmusik	Angel Milk	Electronic
Suzuki	Tosca	Suzuki	Electronic
The Plug	Bonobo	Animal Magic	Electronic
When 6 Loves 9	Only Child	Ordered from the Catalogue	Electronic
Cafe Coca	De-Phazz	Godsdog	Electronic
Svefn G Englar	Sigur Rós	( )	Alternative
One Too Many Mornings	The Chemical Brothers	Exit Planet Dust	Electronic
Satisfaction	Benny Benassi & The Biz	Hypnotica	Dance
I Love My Sex	Benassi Bros.	Hypnotica	Dance
Take Me Away (Into the Night)	4 Strings	Believe	Electronic
Until You Love Me (The Essence Extended Mix)	4 Strings	Ultra: iTrance 2	Dance
Yet Another Day (Original Mix)	Armin van Buuren & Ray Wilson	Ultra: iTrance 2	Dance
Me Plus One	Annie	Anniemal	Electronic
Underpants Gnomes Remix		South Park Mixes	Techno
Clocks	Coldplay	A Rush of Blood to the Head	Alternative
Firestarter	Prodigy		Alternative
I Put Myself Together	Charles Brown	Blues and Other Love Songs	Blues
Only	Nine Inch Nails	With Teeth	Alternative Rock
Purgatory	A Covenant Of Thorns	Hallowed & Hollow	Gothic
Love Crooked Love	A Covenant Of Thorns	Hallowed & Hollow	Gothic
Supergirl	morticians		Pop
Tronce (Short Mix)	Fabrik Nos		Dance
Elektronik Supersonik	Zladko "Zlad" Vladcik		Electronic

Tags: iPod, iTunes, Exporting, XSL, XML, Music, Favorites, Ratings

Using MySQL with .Net

2005-09-30T02:10:00.000-04:00

Continuing research for porting my blog over to WordPress, I started learning how to interact with a MySQL database with C#. I lack experience with MySQL, so this would be a nice little project. At first, I was using an OleDb provider, but continued to get an error DB_E_NOTABLE (0x80040E37) when I tried to access longtext fields or blobs.

After stumbling many times over, I found that the MySQL development site had an article entitled Exploring MySQL in the Microsoft .NET Environment. In the article, Venu Anuganti states that MySQL doesn't officially support OleDb providers such as the MyOLEDB provider. Fortunately, ODBC was a recommended driver. I was able to download the MyODBC driver and install it without and problems. Running my little C# test, I was finally able to read text fields without any errors.

One other thing that I noticed is that I could add a database connection to VS.Net 2005 with both MyODBC and MyOLEDB. The Oledb provider would only show me tables and columns, and would complain about asynchronous connections every time I tried to access data. With MyOLEDB, I saw tables, views, and stored procedures as nodes and I was also able to see data within each table.

Here is a screen shot of my testing tool:

And here is some basic code that I use for it:

using System.Data;
using System.Data.Odbc;
using System.Diagnostics;
using System.Globalization;

...

private string ConnectionString
{
   get
   {
       return string.Format(
           CultureInfo.InvariantCulture,
           @"DRIVER={{MySQL ODBC 3.51 Driver}};SERVER={0};DATABASE={1};UID={2};PASSWORD={3};OPTION=3",
           this.Location, this.DataSource,
           this.UserId, this.Password);
   }
}
private void button1_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
   OdbcConnection connection = null;
   OdbcCommand command = null;
   OdbcDataAdapter adapter = null;
   DataSet data = null;
   try
   {
       connection = new OdbcConnection(this.ConnectionString);
       command = connection.CreateCommand();
       command.CommandText = this.Sql;
       adapter = new OdbcDataAdapter(command);
       data = new DataSet();
       adapter.Fill(data);
       this.dataGrid1.DataSource = data;
   }
   catch(Exception ex)
   {
       MessageBox.Show(this, ex.Message);
   }
   finally
   {
       if(adapter != null)
           adapter.Dispose();
       if(command != null)
           command.Dispose();
       if(connection != null)
       {
           if(connection.State != ConnectionState.Closed)
               connection.Close();
           connection.Dispose();
       }
  152
   }
}

I am hoping that my web hosting provider will permit me to access MySQL over the internet rather then restricting me to a local connection from the website itself. If I can reach the database, then I may be able to import blogger entries and haloscan comments without too many problems over to WordPress.

Tags: MySQL, ODBC, OLEDB, MyODBC, MyOLEDB, .Net, C#, Databases, Programming, Source Code

The Rescheduled Lunch

2005-09-29T20:44:00.000-04:00

A year ago, my coworker and I would have lunch together every day. It has been a long time since we last had lunch together. Lately, plans have been made only to be broken by unforeseen circumstances. Today was no different.

The lunch planned yesterday was rescheduled to today. Yesterdays plans were thwarted since the whole office was going to a Thai Restaurant. Today our plans were foiled again as it was someone's birthday. The party was supposed to start at noon, but the guest of honor didn't show up until a little later. It was a surprise party after all.

The party only involved a cake. After a half hour, I sneaked out. I had only a half hour before a meeting so I grabbed some lunch from the deli in our building. There really wasn't enough time to go out on our lunch break. We shall see what tomorrow brings.

Tags: Lunch, Office, Plans, Work, Lunch Hour, Birthdays, Parties, Food

Preperation for moving day

2005-09-29T05:19:00.000-04:00

I've decided to go with WordPress for my blogging platform. I wanted to test it out at home on one of my computers. I installed MySQL and PHP. I installed the MySQL Administrator to manage the MySQL database to create a user and then give them permission to access a database.

I downloaded WordPress and unzipped it into a directory. Visiting the web site on my local machine told me that MySQL wasn't available to PHP. I spent the next 3 hours debugging the PHP.ini file and googling for help. I tried the following:

in PHP.ini, set extension_dir = "c:\PHP\ext\"
uncomment extension=php_mysql.dll
download pecl-5.0.5-Win32.zip and copy php_mysql.dll to the "ext" subdirectory

No matter what I would do, I would keep getting this error:

"Unable to load dynamic library 'c:\PHP\ext\php_mysql.dll'"

Finally I found an answer in a forum post by DoopyNL.

I've copyed the file libmysql.dll from the main php folder to \windows\system32 and the error went away and I could use the mysql functionality in PHP.

I found the file in php-5.0.5-Win32.zip and copied it to the directory. As soon as that was done, WordPress installed itself without any problems.

Tags: WordPress, Troubleshooting, PHP, MySQL, php_mysql.dll, Installations, Web Development

The Possessed Radio

2005-09-29T02:03:00.000-04:00

I had my own apartment in Moorefield, West Virginia back in 1996. Since I had a job from ten at night to six in the morning, I would sleep during the day. Sometimes this proved hard to do, as my radio was possessed.

In West Virginia, you run into all sorts of odd situations. Mine was due to computer illiteracy. You see, before the internet and even bulletin board systems for that matter, people would chat over CB (Citizens' band) Radio or Ham Radio (also known as Amateur Radio). Today we have the equivalent technologies being used over the internet such as voice chat and podcasting.

At my old apartment, I would hear a one-sided conversation of someone talking on a CB through my radios speakers. It did not matter if the radio was on or off - or even unplugged for that matter! This made it really hard for me to get to sleep even when I would attempt to muffle every speaker in the apartment.

From what I gather, the person on the CB was probably running so much power through there transmitter, that the FCC might raise an eyebrow. I suspect that it may have been the family living above me. I would sometimes hear children being allowed to talk, but it was usually a man and sometimes his wife.

The thing that I hated most about it was when they were looking for someone and just call out for them continuously.

Hey Cosmo!
You there Cosmo?
Cosmo are you there?
Anyone seen Cosmo?
Cosmo
Cosmo
Cosmo
Hey Cosmo!

Tags: Radio, CB, Ham Radio, Amateur Radio, Cosmo, Annoyances, Possession, Possessed

Left Behind

2005-09-28T19:44:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, my co-worker and I agreed to have lunch today. Later in the day another coworker reminded me that I had agreed (last week?) to eat at a Thai restaurant with the rest of the office. I canceled plans with the first coworker and confirmed with the second that I would be eating at the Thai restaurant.

So today I notice it is 11:30 and I didn't know what time everyone would leave for lunch. I go in search for her and other individuals and discover that just about everyone has gone missing. I have no idea where this Thai Restaurant is.

I sent a message to the first coworker that I initially agreed to have lunch with saying "I think they forgot me". She came out of her office and gave me the bad news that she was already in the middle of her lunch since she had thought I was going to the restaurant.

Oh so sad.

Tags: Lunch, Office, Thai Food, Thai, Food, Sad

Running on Knoppix

2005-09-27T23:32:00.000-04:00

My computer spent most of the night last night downloading over 3 gigabytes of the Knoppix bootable DVD with a bit torrent client. I had tried FTP first, but the download speed was very slow and continued to fail on different mirrors.

I installed the NERO software that came with my SONY DVD/CD ReWritable Drive (DRX-720UL) and was able to burn the ISO image to a DVD. I wasn't sure if my computer would permit me to boot off of a DVD. I have booted it off of a normal CD in the past, but I figured DVD's may be different.

The option to choose the DVD drive came up and I was in. The last time I tried Knoppix, I could only get a color depth of 16 colors. It appears that I have everything now at a descent resolution. I was even able to save a personal configuration file to my iPod so that it can remember a few of my preferred settings.

I'm still looking around, but I have already seen that the Mono development environment is here. I had also told bit torrent to download monoppix after it completed Knoppix, but it may have been all for nothing. I haven't seen MySQL yet. I thought I had seen a file related to it in the root directory when looking at the contents from windows.

Audacity is installed here as well. I have used that program for podcasting in the past. Well, I'm going to muck around a bit more. This is really nice.

Bandit

2005-09-26T23:44:00.000-04:00

Out of five kittens rescued last week, Bandit is the only survivor of his litter. His last sibling was euthanized this morning. All of the kittens came down with a respiratory illness. We had thought that the last two were really pulling through fine until I was woken up last night.

Bandit is very small. He shivers a lot and I don't know if it is too cold, or if he is frightened or sick. Angel watches over him constantly and makes sure he gets his medicine and special milk. She has a warm rubbery water pack that she lets him lay on to keep him warm.

He let me get a few pictures without a flash, but started to become picture shy.

We are hoping for the best for this little guy. Every day that passes brings with it a better chance for him to survive. He is very adorable.

Tags: Foster Kittens, Bandit, Kittens, Cats, Pets

Knoppix

2005-09-26T23:10:00.000-04:00

Many people would like to try out a different operating systems, but they don't want to install it over an existing system already in place. Others just might not have a spare computer to toy with. And then there is me. I'm just too lazy to go through the hassel of installing another OS.

Knoppix is one operating system that I find quite handy to use when I want to toy around with Linux. You download an ISO file, burn it to a CD/DVD and boot up your computer with the disc in the drive. There is no installation. Everything runs rite off the disc.

Knoppix has everything. It has your graphic art programs, programming environments, web browsers, document editing software, email, games, and more. And when you are done, just eject the disc and reboot. You are back to using your original operating system as if nothing ever happened. Afraid of viruses? Worry no more! With Knoppix, you just reboot the system.

A few days ago, they came out with version 4.0.2 on DVD and a "Lite" CD version. The DVD version has over 3.5 GB to download, but you can buy an actual disc if you don't have the bandwidth. The CD version may only be able to hold about 600 MB, but the Knoppix folks use compression to fit 2 GB of data within that small space.

Tags: Knoppix, Linux, Operating Systems

RSS for VA Bloggers

2005-09-26T03:26:00.000-04:00

I maintain a small directory of blogs in Virginia. I decided to give this directory a little RSS feed so that people could load it up into there news feed programs. Now when a new site is added, you don't have to go to the directory to find out about it.

RSS Feed

Validate my RSS feed

Tags: RSS, Virginia, Directories, Blogging

Dollar Days

2005-09-25T20:26:00.000-04:00

My mother in-law came over today with the kids. We took off and went to Rent-A-Center and found that they were closed. We were going to go home, but a certain individual in our party wanted to go to the toy store. We decided to set our destination towards Mr. Dollar.

We went through the aisles and my niece would pick out something here and there. We walked out with a sheet of Halloween Stickers, foam letter block puzzles, a bubble set, and a white teddy bear with a heart.

I had some fun blowing bubbles with the kids until most of it was spilled. We played with what little solution we had left and then went back inside and played on the Atari Flashback 2.

Mom had brought over the two kittens that had survived from a respiratory illness so that they could get some of there shots. After she came back with Angel, we ordered Chinese food.

Tags: Dollar, Toys, Kids, Bubbles, Kittens

Lewies Wrap-up #002

2005-09-25T17:09:00.000-04:00

Produced by: Lewis Moten
Channel: Lewies Weekend Wrap-up
Length: 29:37
Show mp3: available for download
Description:

Monday, September 19, 2005
- Do Everything Day
- Kitten Rescue 911
Wednesday
- Save the day with C#
- Promotional T-Shirts and reporting
Thursday
- Pictures within a Picture
- Broadcasting to the stars
Friday
- Dead Can Dance Tickets
Saturday
- A Trademark
- Quality of Life
Sunday
- Moving Day

Tags: Podcasting, MP3, Summaries, Wrap-up

Moving Day

2005-09-25T00:53:00.000-04:00

I've been considering moving my blog over to my domain name at lewismoten.com. I've had the domain name since forever. It used to point to one of my computers at home. My cable company got a little smart and I ended up paying a web hosting company for a small spot to point it at rather then my home.

My little spot on the web over there doesn't get much attention these days. I guess it is because I've been neglecting to use it. I've done quite a few PHP experiments with it, but other then that, it has been setting in the dark.

I wanted to move my blog over to the domain, but Blogger seems to have problems creating a few files and bombs out halfway through publishing. Recently, I've started looking at other blog hosting options. I looked at Movable Type, but the Atomic Bombshell has been having a lot of anxiety problems with it. She has switched over to wordpress and best of all, it is free.

I tried setting up wordpress myself, but I need a MySQL database. Since I went with the cheapest plan when I first setup my website, I don't have a database. So come Monday, I'm going to consult with my hosting provider and see what my options are.

Tags: Blogging, Hosting, Databases, Blogger, Movable Type, WordPress, MySQL, PHP

Quality of Life

2005-09-24T20:49:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago, our television started changing colors. I stuck with it for a while, but it just became unbearable. To get the colors back, I swapped it with the small television that the kids use for there video games when they come and visit. It was a much needed improvement. Unfortunately, I still can't handle it. The quality of my television life is bad. I have to set up close on the floor to see the picture or else it is blurry.

Actually, today was the first time that I checked on my finances for this pay period and was surprised to see a positive balance of about two hundred, fifty dollars. I would love to go out and buy a television with it, but part of that money needs to stay in there for budgeted bills that haven't come out yet. My mother in-law has been helping me get control over everything. Usually I have been down by six hundred dollars around this time - mostly due to phenomenal bank charges on small withdrawals.

I've been considering an investment into an HDTV for a while now, and I am trying to save up. I am approaching a point where I may give in and just buy a regular television. I do not want a regular television though. I have seen HDTV popping up in places where I frequent. Even our conference room has six plasma high definition televisions on one of our walls where I work. My coworker showed me his refurbished HDTV when I took him home once and the quality is nice.

I'm starting to consider Rent-A-Center. I understand that you can rent to own. I'm concerned that the equipment is used and I would be paying retail for it (if not more for financing changes). I headed on over to the site and spent a good hour just gathering information that they were asking for. In the end, they said that I should be expecting a call from a store local to me. I tried calling that very store earlier to see what the hours were in case I could check them out first. At least all of the paperwork is mostly done.

Tags: HDTV, Television, Renting, Paperwork

A trademark

2005-09-24T00:03:00.000-04:00

I had started browsing through a few old data CD's last night that I had made about six years ago. I had burned most of my artwork and projects that I had worked on as well as everything on my desktop and document folders.

It is funny how one can go through old data and get enjoyment reminiscing about past projects and triggering old memories. It is almost like going through an old photo album. While I'm doing this, a little voice keeps popping up in the back of my head - "You're a dork".

One of the images that kept popping up was variations of my own personal trademark. I came up with a sketch of it back when I was getting my higher education. I had partially forgotten about it. Here is a sample of those images along with a few others that I've had on my flickr account for a while now.

I also found a few variations of some of my websites as they had been changed over the past years. It was interesting to look at the source code and browse the databases. Back then, blogs were known as news applications. I remember being confused trying to figure out what the difference was between the two when I first started noticing the term. Today blogging has evolved and news sites are starting to adapt and merge with the trend.

Tags: Backups, Data Recovery, Artwork, Trademarks, Blogging, News

Dead Can Dance Tickets

2005-09-23T00:57:00.000-04:00

I checked my mailbox today and saw an envelope from Ticketmaster. Inside was two tickets for Dead Can Dance. Angel turned down the offer to come with me. I introduced a coworker to the music samples from them on Amazon.com. She may be interested in coming with me to the show. I just have to remember to bring in one of my albums for her to listen to tomorrow.

They have such a large variety of styles. It is perhaps like dark ethnic folk music with astounding vocals. There music is just mesmeric and beautiful. If you haven't heard of Dead Can Dance, I suggest that you check out a few music samples with Amazon.com or iTunes.

I am really excited about the show. I've been reading a few blogs about it as they move from one town to the next. Practically everyone is agreeing that the show is over the top. Lisa Gerrard and Brendan Perry have really out done themselves.

Tags: Mail, Tickets, Dead Can Dance, Music, Concerts, Excited

Broadcasting to the stars

2005-09-22T23:31:00.000-04:00

Aurora from the Atomic Bombshell told me about a site called Blog in Space. I keep thinking of a skit on the muppets about Pigs in Space. The idea is that your blog can be broadcasted into outer-space so that extra-terrestrial beings could read it - free of charge. Just make sure that you don't provoke any of our friendly aliens into hostile reactions to our mother planet.

If your blog is worthy enough, the nice folks might even rate you as "Most Likely to be Contacted". Aurora informed me that her own blog was picked to be featured tomorrow. She claims it was picked for its outstanding ability to potentially provoke alien responses back to planet Earth. I think there are many conspiracy theories behind closed doors in the government regarding how she is singled out among many. Either way, Kudos to her because she really deserves it.

Tags: Aliens, Alien Contact, Broadcasting, Space, Extra-Terrestial, Blogging

Pictures within a picture

2005-09-22T01:53:00.000-04:00

Early this month, I started toying around with the idea of making photographic mosaics from all of the images that I've uploaded to my flickr account. I made a montage generator program that was simple enough to make something, but the quality was just not good enough. Sure, I could make out the photomosaic, but I kept feeling that it could be better.

I've searched the internet before untertaking this project. I couldn't find anything within my budget of "free". Now since I've sort of abandoned the project, I stumbled upon the very program that would have given me great satisfaction if I knew about it in the first place. It is called AndreaMosaic. My favorite part is that this is a freeware program!

I first tried it out on a picture of one of my paintings since it had many colors accross the spectrum. Check out the results!

I can make out the image very well here. Rather then counting each photo as a picture element, it has split them down further to match a section of pixels. It has so many different options too. I can put in black borders between the images or specify how many images to use per row. I was even able to tell it not to duplicate any photographs. I am in awe.

Tags: Mosaics, Photagraphy, Freeware, Programming

Promotional T-Shirts and Reporting

2005-09-21T22:23:00.000-04:00

My coworker invited me into her office today and presented me with a few t-shirts and a cap that she got from the Microsoft Professional Developer Conference 2005 (a.k.a. PDC). I still need to catch up on some PDC blogs about what went on this year.

Angel took a look at the shirts when I got home and took to the Intel 64 sports sweater. There was another shirt advertising Automated QA and one for the PDC conference itself. I love wearing these shirts around the house. I can get messy and not have to worry about ruining the shirt since it's just a promotional item.

Today I've done a lot of mucking around in Crystal Reports. I dealt with exporting as Word and Excel files and emailing them as attachments. I also got the html version to print without our sites template when the end-user prints it out. As always, there were tons of formatting issues and troubleshooting with the report. I'm just glad that it isn't like the old days where I would spend days hunting down dll's, hot fixes, and patches on the Crystal Reports website. It's been a few years, but I'm doing ok with them.

Tags: PDC, Developers, Conferences, T-Shirts, Free, Crystal Reports, Work, Angel, Shirts, Clothing

Save the day with C#

2005-09-21T01:38:00.000-04:00

My manager and co-worker went out to the west to attend some conferences that introduce upcoming Microsoft technologies. I would have gone, but I have this insane fear of flying. I came into work this morning and found a cap on my desk with the emblem "C#". It is supposed to be a spoof off of the Superman logo of the big "S".

The back of the hat says "Save the day with C#". I've saved plenty of days with C#, but I could have done the same with VB.Net. These days, the language you code in is more of a preference rather then a requirement of what the application that you are creating needs to be capable of.

I may be a C# guru, but I doubt I'll be wearing this hat into work. Angel tried the cap on when I arrived at home and she looked great. I don't know why, but women in baseball caps can be attractive at times. Unfortunately, my own mug doesn't go well with caps.

Angels mother was here when I got home. It seems that another kitten has had an unfortunate demise, but did not have to go through as much suffering as the other kittens. Angel is strong and is hopeful that the other two will make it. Every hour that passes makes the situation more optimistic.

After her mom left, we tuned into our Video on Demand cable channel. Although we have digital cable, it was very slow loading up and navigating through the movies. After watching a preview, we choose to watch Are we there yet? The movie was funny and cute. It reminds me of Johnson Family Vacation. Here is a quick summary of both movies:

A man buys a brand new Ford Escalade complete with spinning rims. On a long trip across the country, the vehicle is ruined by multiple synchronized unfortunate events that are beyond extraordinary. The fate of his most prized material possession doesn't matter because at the end, the kids respect him, he gets the girl, and most of all - he has insurance.

Tags: Hats, C#, Are we there yet?, Johnson Family Vacation, Movies, Kittens

Kitten Rescue 911

2005-09-19T18:55:00.000-04:00

Five kittens were in a tree that did not yet have there eyes open. A little girl told our friend Lisa about some kittens falling from a tree near an abandoned house in our neighborhood. The place is well known as a safe-house for ferrel cats. Lisa took the abandoned kittens and worked with my wife to nurse them.

Today I woke up and Angel asked me to take her back over to Lisa's house. One of the kittens was having a tough time breathing. We came back as there wasn't anything we could do but wait. Later in the day, he died and one of his siblings was starting to have the same problems.

Angels sister came over and took the kittens to the vet to have them checked out and see if anything could be determined. We are all just hoping that everything turns out ok.

Update

The second kitten has also passed away. The vet was able to see the four kittens before the last one died. It turns out that they all have respiratory problems. Angel told me that the two that have died so far are the same ones that had fallen out of the tree that there mother dragged them up into. The three remaining kittens are now on medicine and quarantined.

Tags: Kittens, Emergencies, Abandoned, Pets, Fostering, Nursing, Death

Do Everything Day

2005-09-19T01:06:00.000-04:00

I may have gotten up late today, but that was no exception for the days work. While Angel got her hair cut, I went over to the grocery store and picked up some non perishables. After I was done, I headed on over to Blockbuster. I picked up a DVD of a Japanese animation movie called Steam Boy. I returned to the salon and Angel was in the middle of paying for her hair cut.

We headed on over to Wally World (Wal-Mart), and then went on over to do some grocery shopping after that. I was a bit surprised to see that for the amount of food that we purchased, the price was pretty low. It seemed like we had a greater variety of food then we normally purchase as well. We didn't feel like cooking tonight, so we both went ahead and grabbed some food at the buffet provided in the grocery store.

We went home, put things away and had dinner. I then left to pick up some pet food at the pet store. As I arrived, an employee was blocking the doors and I saw a sign indicating that it was past closing. I went over to Wal-Mart to pick up a few things for the gerbils, but I would have to return tomorrow for our Nutro cat food and some kitty litter.

I spent a good amount of time just cleaning up gerbil cages and then configuring them in a new way. I was happy because I finally figured out how to get everything connected in my little gerbil city. They now have 7 compartments that are connected with tubes all over my computer desk and dresser. Every time I change this stuff around, they go crazy running around. They will run around for hours figuring out where everything goes. I think it is good to help keep there minds active.

I fed some treats to our cats and had to ask my wife how many we had. Now that her sister has left, we are short a few cats. Her reply was "Seven" and I was only counting six. It turns out that Ashe was not present, but he never eats the treats anyway.

I started watching Steam Boy. I was a quarter the way through it when Angel came to join me. I started it over for her and cleaned up the kitchen until she got to the part where I left off. The movies scenery is just astounding. The plot is ok, but some of the characters are just horrible. Scarlet was perhaps the worst. She would punch her little dog, treat everyone like trash, and was just oblivious to what was going on around her. My wife and I thought the movie was about to end a few times, but something else would just come up to make it go longer.

After the movie was over, Angel and I went over to her friends house. Her friend had four kittens that were rescued. Angel is going to nurse and watch over them. These don't even have there eyes open yet. Angels sister also showed up with her husband, supplies and some helpful advice. Everyone's concern seemed to be focused on finding the mother to help take care of the kittens during the time that everyone else sleeps. Otherwise you have to make sure to feed them some kitten milk formula every few hours, all throughout the night and day. We then left to go back home and Angel tended to the kittens.

I got a shower and worked on the kitchen a little more. I dismantled many parts to the stove and cleaned them pretty good with a steel wool pad. There was a lot of gunk building up everywhere. I pulled off the knobs, elements, and oil drip guards. I still have much to do to get the stove completely cleaned, but at least I got the top of it looking better. My legs are just worn out now and it is time to get some sleep.

Tags: Steamboy, Movies, Shopping, Angel, Groceries, Gerbils, Litter, City, Cat Treats, Cats, Kittens, Kitchen, Stove, Cleaning

Lewies Weekend Wrap-up #001

2005-09-18T02:58:00.000-04:00

I'm trying my hand at podcasting again. Rather then going with dreams, I'm just going to give a commentary on my blog for the current week. There are both RSS and m3u feeds available for anyone who is interested.

RSS Feed
m3u Feed

Produced by: Lewis Moten

Channel: Lewies Weekend Wrap-up

Length: 35:49

Uploaded: 24 minutes ago

More info:

Show mp3: available for download

Number of Downloads: 1

OdeoRank: Unranked

Description: Sunday, September 11, 2005

Monday

Doing the impossible

Tuesday

Transparent Wallpaper

Wednesday

Thursday

Friday

Saturday

Tags: Podcasting, Lewie, Weekend Wrap-up, MP3, Audio

Moving on out

2005-09-17T19:42:00.000-04:00

Today my sister in-law moved out of the house. She had been living with my wife and I for a few years now. Emotions around the house were (and still are) running pretty high. It is much quieter, or just seems that way. An empty house.

Our finances are getting on track. I suspect that the utility bills and living expenses will go down with less people and pets in the house. Angel and I are starting to think about home improvements, appliances, and a few other things that we would like to take care of. Here is a small list of a few things to start with:

Eye Exams and Glasses
HDTV
Washing Machine and Dryer
Dishwasher
Refrigerator
New Carpeting

The TV is only at the top of this list because our old one died. We have a little television for now that the kids used to use for there video games when they would visit. It is hard to see words on it. The two of us are both near sighted, so it doesn't help that the couch is on the other side of the room.

Tags: Moving, Home Improvements, Appliances

5 Musics in your iPod

2005-09-17T00:47:00.000-04:00

Well, it appears that I have been tagged with a meme. It shouldn't be too hard though. I have been instructed to list the last 5 tracks on my iPod in shuffle mode. It hardly requires any work from me. Anyway, here it goes:

Time Baby ii on The Crow
All Is Full Of Love by Björk on Homogenic
Happy Birthday by The Birthday Massacre on Nothing And Nowhere
Breathe by Telepopmusik on Genetic World
Not Gonna Get Us by t.A.T.u. on 200 KMpH In The Wrong Lane

That was easy enough. Now I need to pick 5 friends. If any of you don't have an iPod, don't fret. Here are the instructions provided on the original post:

Don't worry if you have'nt got an iPod, you can still play along!
Go to the nearest cupboard you can fit your head in and then hide your face in shame for not having one of the nicest little devices on the planet! "Who's a naughty boy..... tut tut tut...".

I don't see the resoultion in there, but my guess is that if you have iTunes or some other audio sofware, then you can pick the last five on a randomized list of all of your songs. Ok, let's get this done. (Lewie closes his eyes really tight.) I cast my misfortune on the Atomic Bombshell, Stacy, Krozy, Russel, and Jenny.

Tags: Memes, iPod, Music

To Kill a Padidle

2005-09-16T23:31:00.000-04:00

So I was driving home yesterday after work as I always do. I noticed that the reflection of my lights from the car in front of me was giving a few points away to anyone playing a game of Padidle. I went over to Wal-Mart and used an electronic gadget to find out what kind of light my car needed. I found one for about $10 (Sylvania 9007 XV).

Now mind you, I never changed a cars lights before except for a red tail light once. The head lights are a bit harder to get to and I didn't know what I was supposed to do. I spent a few minutes mucking around trying to pull the wire out while trying to avoid getting burnt by the engines heat. I soon gave up and drove home, panicked that I may get pulled over for a burnt out headlight as I pass the police station on the road that I live at the end of.

I got home ok and tried again and gave up again. I was not having any luck. During my lunch break today and after work, I tried again and still failed. I just got some dirty hands. I did manage to find the ring that I could twist off and move around, but I didn't know what to do with it so I put it back.

Tonight a while after I got home, I stuck it out and tried a bit harder with more determination. I wasn't going to give up so easily. I was mainly after that power cord. I would wiggle it up and down, left and right. I tried twisting it, pushing it in and out. The thing wouldn't budge.

I would keep looking at the new bulb in its package for any clues as to how to remove the old one. I felt around for anything that might release it like a button or something. I was afraid that I would break something if I wasn't doing it rite. After about 10 minutes it finally came out. It was just stuck in really tight.

So after that, it was easy to do the rest. I got the ring off next and then pulled the light bulb out. The bulb itself was also stuck in pretty tight but not as bad as the powercord. Getting the new bulb in was easy. I felt so proud of my accomplishment of replacing a headlight.

It sounds like such a simple task. I was actually starting to consider bringing the car into a local garage just to replace the bulb with the one I had purchased. I would have felt very pathetic, but I was determined to get that bulb changed one way or another.

Tags: Padidle, Headlights, Automobiles, Troubleshooting, Dodge, Neon, Dodge Neon 2000

POSTNET Barcodes

2005-09-16T02:55:00.000-04:00

Being a resident in the U.S., I often see mail come to my home address with bar codes on it. I never paid much attention to them. Today that changed. I dug around and found that these are called POSTNET Barcodes. Each digit is represented by 2 tall bars and 3 short bars.

At first, I thought it was setup on the base-2 system. Base 2 would represent each tall bar with the values of 16, 8, 4, 2 and 1 in respect to the bars placement. The POSTNET system assigns the values of 7, 4, 2, 1 and 0. So if I wanted to represent the digit 5, I would choose bars representing 4 and 1 ".l.l.". In binary, it would have been "..l.l". The binary system would also pose a problem in that there are 21 extra numbers that would never be used.

This new numbering system causes a problem with the digit zero since you "must" choose 2 bars. Looking at all the possible combinations, you can see that 7 and 4 equal 11. Since 11 is not a single digit, this combination is used instead to represent zero. So here is a break down of each digit:

...ll
..l.l
..ll.
.l..l
.l.l.
.ll..
l...l
l..l.
l.l..
ll...

So now we all know the numbers. There are three types of barcodes. Now lets look at the format of the barcode. Here are mine:

Zip: 22191 (5)
l..l.l..l.l...lll.l.....ll.l.l.l

Zip+4: 22191-4248 (7)
l..l.l..l.l...lll.l.....ll.l..l..l.l.l..ll..l.l...ll

Zip+4 and Data Point: 22191-4248-26 (9)
l..l.l..l.l...lll.l.....ll.l..l..l.l.l..ll..l...l.l.ll..l.l..l

Each barcode begins and ends with a full line. The first 5 digits are your Zip Code. The next 4 (if present) are your Zip+4 address. If you have a PO Box, or a building number, then you may also have the last two digits of the number representing the delivery point. My house number is 15826, so the last two digits (26) are used.

You may have noticed that each code also has an additional digit at the end. It helps the scanner to confirm that it read the scan correctly. To figure out the code, you add the sum of all digits. Next, you determine the difference between it and the next number divisible by 10. That is your check digit.

2 + 2 + 1 + 9 + 1 = 15 (+5 = 20)
2 + 2 + 1 + 9 + 1 + 4 + 2 + 4 + 8 = 33 (+7 = 40)
2 + 2 + 1 + 9 + 1 + 4 + 2 + 4 + 8 + 2 + 6 = 41 (+9 = 50)

Just for fun, I put together a little javascript code for you to experiment with:

Tags: POSTNET, Barcodes, Postage, Mail, Scanning, JavaScript

The Dead Still Dance

2005-09-15T21:21:00.000-04:00

In the mid nineties, I left home and started my higher education. I was faced with a culture shock quite a many of times. Along the way, I was introduced to different forms of music. One particular band was called "Dead Can Dance". The person who recommended it described it as "Gothic Lullabies". There is (or was) a large controversy determining if DCD was "Goth" or not. Either way, I don't care. I will say this - the music really appealed to the "Goth" crowd.

Since then, I have amazed a small collection of 9 albums of there's and a tribute album as well. I have fallen in love with the voices. One thing that really got me was watching the movie Gladiator. Every time I heard a woman's voice with a particular style of music, I would keep telling myself that it sounds so much like Lisa Gerrard singing. After going home and looking at the information on the internet, I found that it was in fact her singing.

Anyhow, the group separated ways a few years ago because they had too much going on with other projects. There have been many times where I had just sat back listening to there music and wishing that I could have attended one of there performances. This was especially happening while listening to there live album - Toward the Within.

Well guess what. The dead have arisen. Dead Can Dance is on tour. One of my coworkers told me about it and I immediately rushed to see if tickets were still available through Ticketmaster for Dead Can Dance. Seats were still available but selling out quick on October tenth. One site stated that the Dead Can Dance shows were selling out in advance. The good seats were already taken so I grabbed two tickets for the second level.

Dead Can Dance
Music Center at Strathmore, N. Bethesda, MD
Monday October 10, 2005 8:00 pm

Seat location: section UP TR, row D, seats 33-34
Total Charge: $132.50

My stomach is feeling like butterflies. I haven't felt like this in such a long time. The excitement is just off the charts. They are also releasing an album from each major city of live music that night. I may actually order one for Washington, D.C.

My wife has only heard a few songs that I play for her every now and then. She likes The Ubiquitous Mr Lovegrove that is on the album, Into The Labyrinth. There are so many that I personally like. Here are just a few that are on the top of my list:

Ullyses
Enigma of the Absolute
Anywhere out of the World
In the kingdom of the Blind the One-Eyed are Kings
The Song of the Sibyl
Fortune Presents Gifts Not According to the Book
Black Sun
Fortune
East of Eden
In Power We Entrust the Love Advocated
The Arcane
Yulunga
Ariadne
Song of the Stars
Song of the Dispossessed
Song of the Nile
Advent
Avatar
I Can See Now
American Dreaming
Cantara
Don't Fade Away
In the Wake of Adversity

I could keep going with the song that I like best, but those are just a few. They have so many it makes you wonder how they have time for anything else.

Tags: Dead Can Dance, Music, Shows, Ticketmaster, Bands, Lisa Gerrard, Washington D.C., Entertainment, DCD, Goth

More Odeo Testing

2005-09-15T12:05:00.000-04:00

I went ahead and tried out the phone posting to Odeo, but instead it posted to my blog here:

It turns out that Odeo and Audioblogger both use the listenlab service. Both have the same number that you dial in with. Odeo didn't tell me that the phone number that I had entered was already being used. When I logged in, everything seemed normal and posted fine (Both accounts had the same phone number and pin number).

I think Listenlab needs to setup the service to announce what affiliated service it is that you are posting to - Odeo or Audioblogger.

Tags: Podcasting, Odeo, Mobile Phones, Listenlab

Search Google for Blogs

2005-09-14T23:18:00.000-04:00

I got an email inviting me to check out the new Odeo Studio for creating podcasting audio feeds and files. I was in the middle of setting up my microphone to work with it when I got a message from Russel on Google Talk. He sent me a link over to Google to Search Blogs. He blogged about it and found that when you type in my name (Lewie Moten), a link to his website is the first link. If you search for Lewis Moten, Blogg'd is the first site to come back.

This feature is very much needed. There have been many times when I went searching for a particular subject on google but was trying to find blogs talking about it. I finally have an easy way to do this.

Anyhow, his microphone wasn't working and we cut the conversation short. I left a voice mail on Rowland Cutlers Skype account and then went on to check out Odeo. I believe that this service might be the behemoth of podcasting software if it is free. Everything is there for you. It is so simple to use and you don't install anything. The only thing that you do is connect a microphone and go.

I also uploaded a sound clip and was able to start playing it and adjust a few settings during my podcast. I like that I could make it loop as well. When I played the audio file back, the quality was really bad with the sound clip. The first audio file that I made without sound clips was fine. I guess they need to do some more work.

Well, tune in to my new odeo podcast and I may publish a few more things.

Tags: Google, Podcasting, Odeo, Searching, Blogs

Create a South Park Character

2005-09-14T02:48:00.000-04:00

I know I've seen the South Park Studio site around before, but I guess I never blogged about it. Any how Stacy sent the link to me and I went ahead and dabbled a little bit.

I had my fun making a South Park character. For a little web-based RPG action with this style of characters, you may want to look into the game, "Adopt a Canadian".

Tags: South Park, Cartoons, Television, Gernators, Characters, Games, RPG

Transparent Wallpaper

2005-09-13T00:59:00.000-04:00

So a while back, Aurora posted an entry about some creative desktop wallpaper. A group of individuals have taken a picture of there computers environment without the computer screen. Editing the photo, they were able to crop the area where there monitor should be and reshape the image to fit on the screen. The screen was then displayed with the image while another picture was taken to achieve the effect of a transparent screen.

I have been wanting to try my hand at this for a while. I finally decided that I was in the mood for a quickie and went to work. My pet cat Gizmo was setting next to me. This cat never wants to leave once he has found a nice spot to set near me. What a perfect centerpiece.

The first image was easy. I just set up a tripod and took a picture. I placed my laptop in front of him and then took another picture. Now I knew what area to pull out of the picture. Now at this point, I could just cut out one picture and let the second picture show through - but that would be cheating. I needed to take a picture of the laptop with Gizmo as the background wall paper.

I pulled out a portion of the image that I needed and reshaped it to be a rectangular image to fit the entire screen. I used scaling and perspective transformations. I then loaded the image onto the laptop as the background. I then set it up to a screen saver too so that I could get a picture without all the icons and the start bar in the way.

The tripod was still in the same position from the first photograph, but the laptop was not. I had used the computer and moved the laptop to get to it. I didn't even think before I took the picture. I forgot to line everything up! Of all the things to do wrong.

Gizmo at this point had spotted a more comfortable spot where the laptop wasn't setting against him and moved himself away. It will have to do. I now have experience of the process of doing this. If there is a next time, I will put more effort into perfecting my technique.

Tags: Photography, Transparency, Wallpaper, Pets, Gizmo, Experiments, Tricks

Doing the impossible

2005-09-12T20:43:00.000-04:00

So last Thursday a problem presented itself at work within the last two hours that I couldn't solve. It was a very important problem that needed to be fixed and Friday was already booked to be my day off. I couldn't solve the problem, but I was able to stay late and duplicate it by the end of the day.

My mind had been racing at different parts of the weekend trying to hash out the answer. The task seemed impossible and I was terrified that I wouldn't be able to solve it at all. It was very hard just to grasp what the problem actually was, let alone solve it. I was fearing the worst.

I arrived at the office today and began my daily tasks. For a time, I eagerly tried many approaches to solving this puzzle. Like stars revealing themselves slowly in the early night, I started getting little bits and pieces to start showing me the answer. Not sure if I would be able to fully solve the predicament at hand, I continued on. I felt like I might be wasting my time and should be directing my energy onto an entirely different strategy.

After all the hard work, I figured it out. It wasn't perfect, but it was the answer I was looking for. The basis of my work ensued and finally I worked out all of the other peculiar workings that needed to be fixed along the way. The answer was complete, simple, and yet complex.

Why do these things worry me so? I always seem to be able to come up with the answer when all seems to be lost. The complexity overwhelms me, but yet I still prevail. Why am I always so quick to misjudge myself?

Tags: Work, Databases, Troubleshooting, Bugs

He is the man!

2005-09-11T19:27:00.000-04:00

I'll admit it. I love playing with programs that allow you to create faces. Most that I have used in the past were cartoon faces. Today I found one called Morphasis that was made from photographs of people. It reminds me of something you might see on a show of CSI. Police Sketch Artists may end up being replaced by computers.

I didn't get the face to look like me at all. There are not enough choices to get it rite. The way that my results turned out, this guy could pass as a family member. I could always submit a photo of myself for everyone else to use, but it could take months for it to get into the face database.

Along with the morphasis generator, you can see many user favorites or have the generator create one randomly for you. One big problem that I had with the site was browser compatability. When using Firefox, the eyes, mouth, eye brows and such were hidden behind the face itself.

Tags: Generators, Faces, Sketch Artists

Relatives in the news

2005-09-11T02:55:00.000-04:00

I was browsing through technorati and searched for my last name - "Moten". The second link caught my attention:

Massage Schools & - Chamber Celebrates...
with female patients. The West Virginia Massage Therapy Licensure Board revoked The Moten Place Massage

Hmm... one person shot into my mind, but it was hard to believe that he would be involved in something like this. I went and did a little research on what was going on.

The blog appeared to be automated in that it just gathers some results from google about a keyword or subject and posts links each day. It lead me over to the original post, "Massage Therapist Loses License for Misconduct".

Apparently his license for The Moten Place Massage Therapy had been revoked by the West Virginia Massage Therapy Licensure Board. A woman had complained that he had allegedly exposed and examined her breasts to check for cancerous lumps. The board stated that he wasn't licensed to perform medical evaluations or diagnosis. She also went on to allege that he exposed and massaged her buttocks and made sexual comments during the session.

Ouch! Those are some heavy allogations. The article went on to report that an undercover investigator went in and received a massage. She also reported similar actions. Two other female clients went on to file similar complaints while the board was doing its investigation.

I don't know my uncle Leon that well. In fact, I don't know him at all. I think he is my fathers uncle, so that would make him my great uncle Leon. I heard that he is blind and performs massages in West Virginia somewhere in Beckly. Looking at the boards site, his license expired on 8/10/2005. I can't find any other information on this.

One interesting note is that I found a picture of our family crest on his web page. It doesn't look anything like the one that I got from the Historical Research Center. It makes me wonder how accurate H.R.C. really is with there information. Was I taken advantage of? Well, that is a story for another day.

Tags: Massage, Therapy, Health, Family, Uncle Leon, Moten, Licenses

QR Codes

2005-09-10T23:29:00.000-04:00

So lately I have discovered something called QR Codes. The industry has been limited in the amount of data that a regular barcode can hold (something like 16 numbers) , and the amount of space required that a barcode needs to occupy. A few 2 dimensional barcodes have popped up and answered the call of commerce. You may have seen some of these on your UPS packages that you received over the past few years. You could go so far as to say that they look like modern hieroglyphics.

Everyone has there own standard. However, QR code appears to be something that could affect us as people directly. QR code is so widely accepted in Japan that it has integrated itself within Japans social structure. Many Japanese camera phones come with the ability to recognize QR code. You simply take your phone, point, click, and wallah! You can enter bookmarks, addresses, or start an email application with the senders email address, a brief subject and a message already typed up for you. All you have to do is send the email out after you look over the information.

I tried my hand at generating a QR code for my own website with a QR code generator. The QR code generators are limited with the size of the QR codes created since phones only go up to version 10 (out of 40). Take a look:

These codes are blown up and are usually much smaller. Both codes contain the same information. The first is for DoCoMo and reads:

MEBKM:TITLE:Lewies Blogs;URL:http://lewismoten.blogspot.com/;;

The second is for Vodafone and reads:

Lewies Blogs http://lewismoten.blogspot.com/

It appears that phone makers haven't agreed on a standard on how to store the data, but they did agree on using QR Codes. There are even applications out there that will generate a hybrid QR code to support both phones, but it is much larger.

Many applications are comming out in the Japanese market. Imagine this, you are shopping in a grocery store and you spot a QR Code on a head of lettuce. You take out your phone, take a picture and see that it has not yet expired. Well hey, we can all do that now with a regular printed date - but with the code, you can store much more information or link to that information contained on a website. You could see such things as the origin, soil composition, organic fertilizer percentage, use of pestisides, herbisides and the name of the farm it was growing on. Guess what? It is already happening - in Japan.

Unfortunately, this craze that has been going on for a significant amount of time in Japan just hasn't made it overseas to America yet. The US industry is a little worried. I have read that there are applications that allow a user to scan a code on a product in a store, and then compare prices on Amazon.com. The other problem is that RFID is just over the horizon. The US Industry may find this more beneficial to them. RFID can't be read by cell phones and will not be visually identifiable to our society.

Along with scanning things into your mobile phones applications, there are also QR games. Events are held in a store and also some cities where special QR codes have been strategically placed. Contestants go around and take pictures of the codes to read the information contained within them.

I think there is potential for someone to create a service that will bypass the need for camera phones to be equiped with QR scanning. You see, I can already take a picture and email it to someone. What prevents a company from creating a service that will decode the QR code for me and then send an email back to my phone with the decoded content? Sure, it is much slower, but hey - I could decode these little buggers with my current phone!

For anyone who can't wait, there is a free java program that will read the codes for you. I took a picture of these with a camera at odd angles and loaded them up. It was able to successfully decode the images.

Visit http://www.intelcom.ru/2d/english/demo.php
Download the java application for decoding QR Codes: "QR Code-demo (jar)"
Make sure you have JAVA installed on your machine and run!

Now that you can decode QR Codes, you can head on over to a QR Code Blog where all entries are posted as QR Codes. After you decode the QR Codes, you'll need to translate the Japanese to English. I like the post about his valentines day project where he made a QR code on White Chocolate. There are plenty of images to show you how he did it.

Tags: Barcodes, Scanning, Mobile Phones, Commerce, Codes, Encoding, QR, QR Codes

My kingdom for some TP

2005-09-09T23:05:00.000-04:00

I started to clean my gerbils many different compartments today. In each compartment, they have different bedding material. I do this so I can give them a choice. They can choose from wood shavings, sand, cotton-like bedding, Dusting Powder, Alfalfa, and ... Toilet Paper.

That's rite - toilet paper. Of all the different types of bedding, they prefer the toilet paper. They play in all of the other materials, but home is where the softness is.

My wife and I discovered the use of toilet paper after one of our cats decided to play with a new roll of toilet paper. Angel just picked it all up and handed it to me in a big bundle of fluff. It was clean so I just handed it to the gerbils.

These guys can build some pretty mean nests with the stuff. I didn't even bother derolling the stuff today. I just put an entire roll in the cage and let them have at it. I may have to rethink my decision because it is taking them some time to chew through it.

Besides the toilet paper, they go crazy over the toilet paper rolls. They love to chew things and the stiff paper keeps them happy. I kind of look forward to change the roll just so that I can give the cardboard roll. If I don't get to it first, everyone else throws them out from habbit.

Tags: Gerbils, Pets, Toilet Paper, Bedding, Nests

Apple only got it half rite

2005-09-08T21:35:00.000-04:00

I must be in the dark here. Here I am with a nice shiny iPod and I didn't even realize that another version of iTunes came out until this morning by one of my commentors. I wonder how long it has been out.

A while back, I complained about the lack of playlist folders in iTunes. It appears that Apple got smart and gave us this feature. I can now create folders, and put folders inside of folders. This is nice because it allows me to categorize things and manage my playlists.

Unfortunately, the folks at apple forgot about the iPod itself. My playlists still synchronize, but the folders do not. So now all of my playlists still appear under the "playlists" folder, but I don't see any folders. Unfortunately, I renamed a few playlists and now it looks horrible.

I created a "Decades" folder and renamed a playlist from "Decades: 1960" to just "1960" and put it in the "Decades" folder. I did this for all of my decades. I expected my iPod to have a "Decades" folder ... but NO! I just have my 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, and 2000 playlists showing up directly in my playlist's root folder. I am so mad!

So any how, let's take a brief look at what else they added. You'll have to take these with a grain of salt because I am just really upset.

New Look - Streamlined design makes iTunes even easier to use.

The colors changed and I now have the ability to make fonts bigger. I guess that is considered making it easier to use? If they made it skinnable so that I could customize the look, then that would be something to boast about.

Search Bar - Find stuff fast and refine your search with the handy new Search Bar.

When I search for something, I can now click some filters (all, music, audiobooks, podcasts, videos and booklets??) and I can also search by artist, title, or all of the metadata

Smart Shuffle - Adjust random playback to hear what you want.

Blah, blah, blah. I hadn't used shuffle yet as the play lists do pretty much anything I want them to.

Sync from Outlook - iTunes now supports iPod syncing for Outlook and Outlook Express on Windows PCs.

Outlook keeps badgering me that an application is trying to access it each time. Why couldn't they synchronize with a program that I use like Thunderbird?

Playlist Folders - Organize all your playlists into folders.

They forgot to mention "in iTunes only". We all know how I feel about this one.

Parental Controls - Limit kids’ access to the iTunes Music Store and sharing features.

Interesting, but I don't need it. I think a lot of kids might be using this on there parents.

Album Reviews - Browse over 1,000 album reviews.

I couldn't figure out how to access these until I realized they were stairing me in the face. Apparently the reviews are just a description by the iTunes folks themselves. Hey Apple, why don't you let the community get in on this action? I'd trust a fellow consumers review before I'd take the vendors point of view.

The Complete Harry Potter - Download all six audiobooks or the Digital Box Set and add the collector’s iPod with Hogwarts crest.

I didn't get this with the installation of iTunes. It costs hundreds of dollars in the music store. Where is my complete Harry Potter set that was supposed to come with iTunes 5?

iTunes for Your Mobile Phone - Sync music to the Motorola ROKR E1.

The Motorola ROKR E1 can only hold about 100 songs. It looks like Apple is just testing the waters with the Mobile Phone market. However, I do like the dancing girls on the phones website.

Tags: iPod, iTunes, Software, Music, Gadgets, Style

Buddha Collections

2005-09-08T00:31:00.000-04:00

So over the years I have started picking up trinkets here and there. Most of my trinket collection consists of Buddhas of various sizes and colors. The chubby joyful little fellow is a nice site to look at and envy.

I don't know much about his story, garments and various objects he holds, or the religion itself. I simply collect them because they are nice to have near by. Some were gifts.

The three purple Buddhas are set evenly spaced out over the top of my bedroom door on the trimming. The big brown one setting down migrates around my room and sometimes sets in front of me next to my monitor. The brown one standing sets on a shelf over my bed. The rest set on the other shelf in my room with many other trinkets.

One of the kids likes to play with the big brown one setting down and the mini red Buddhas. We like to pretend that he is going to eat them. Then he turns out to be there best friend and protects them. It is all fun and games.

So I'm starting to wonder what the Buddhas are really for. Are they simply trinkets? Are they religious items? Is there any superstitions that go with them? Any stories?

Also, it seems that there are two different kind of Buddhas. One Buddha is the jolly heavyset guy who is all smiles. The other I see from temples of a thinner, younger man who appears to be meditating. Why are there two different Buddhas?

Tags: Buddha, Trinkets, Collections, Religions

Lewies Walkabout

2005-09-05T23:42:00.000-04:00

So today I felt a little cooped up. I had been in the house all day and I needed to go out and do something. I grabbed the camera and left the house. It was a very bright day outside. The sky was a beautiful shade of blue and there was a gentle breeze. I could hear the sound of lawn mowers in the distance.

I headed on down past the church towards a well known path into the woods. I wasn't too far down the path when I looked down and noticed a watch. I picked it up and it had the correct time. It was a timex watch. The face had some dirt on it, but it was still working and didn't have any other damage. I realized that I had just found some time. I pocketed the watch and continued on my journey.

I would keep running into a lot of spider webs. Eventually I picked up a stick and started waving it in front of me as I walked. It worked half the time, but at other times I was still covered in webs. It gave me a jittery feeling every time it happened. I would keep stepping back and brushing everything off frantically in case there were any spiders on me as well.

I started smelling smoke and found a hole full of ashes. It looked like a stump was burnt out of the ground. Parts of the ground were still smouldering underneath and I could feel heat comming from it. I tried to stomp on part of it, but it seemed to only make things worse. I saw more smoke comming up and got the feeling that I was only feuling what was underneith. I heard some people comming and got out of there.

Many trees caught my eye on my little adventure. Most of the trees are small, but the really big ones are beautiful. They are usually littered with many bumps and broken branches. Just looking up at them makes me feel very small compared to everything else. Its beautiful to see the leaves rustling and feeling a sense of nature everywhere around you.

I arrived at an area that my wife and I went swimming at a couple summers ago. It was great at the time because the water was much deeper and cleaner. It was well secluded. Today the water is low and polluted. It has a blue hue to it. A few kids on ATVs and Motorbikes ran through the area tearing up the little beach that was there.

I like the natural look of hollow trees. They are beautiful to look at. Someone had the nerve to spray some bad grafiti on one of these trees near the swimming hole. This is just done in really bad taste. It is a sad sight to see today. It angers me to see such horrible deeds. Memories are the only good left of this place.

Most of the flowers in the woods were bright yellow. I saw many butterflies, dragonflies and even some wasps playing in the myriad of flowers. I got a picture of a wasp pollenating one of them. I slowly got closer and closer until I could see it pretty well. I was also on guard in case it started to fly. I didn't want to be stung in the middle of the woods.

I was fortunate enough to get up close enough and take a picture of some painted ladies. I got a yellow one down by a make-shift dam. A blue one was also found over near a construction site on the edge of the forest. I seem to have better luck with the blue ones as they don't fly away when I get too close and they slowly open and close there wings for me.

I came to an area being developed for a new community. One saying around my county is "As long as there are trees, there will always be development". It is sad. When I came up on the cleared land, I saw someone running around on his ATV around a water trap. He was really enjoying himself and spinning out on the turns.

After I crossed the barren land, I reached the woods again and started finding junk. There were many old tires in the woods. I found three of them together near a dried up river bed. Sometimes I get the feeling that these tires just grow in the wild. No one seems to appreciate the forest around here. I continued walking through the woods until I found a path.

Vines are beautiful I like to see them in all different sizes twisting around trees and climbing. It reminds me of dancing for some odd reason. Unfortunately a few vines will cut into trees and strangle them like a python does to its victim. If the vine dies away after this, you will sometimes be left with a really interesting tree formation.

I got home and emptied my pockets. Besides picking up the watch, I also found some pine cones of different shapes and sizes as well as some acorns. I took a few pictures and then started working on all the the pictures I had just taken. I started to adjust the brightness and contrast on my pictures to pull out the rich colors of the forest. I even cropped a few pictures as well.

Tags: Walking, Forst, Woods, Photography, Boredom, Adventures

Montage Generator

2005-09-05T02:22:00.000-04:00

I've been slaving away a little bit over the past few days. A little here, a little there. All of it done to make a simple image out of many. I posted a glimpse into what I was trying to achieve a few days ago. Since some of my readers expressed some interest in the program, I started changing it to be used by anyone. Here is a preview of the program itself:

Behind the sceens, I have been having difficulty determining the average color of an image. I made a breakthrough yesterday and got it working with color. Today I spent a good amount of time getting the average color for very large images at a very fast pace.

In the end, I learned about some methods that are available to me to bypass the GDI+ library. I found a really good tutorial for working with those bits and got some samples working. This helped speed up the processing of the thumbnail images that I had, but very large images were still taking too long. Instead I went ahead got 1024 pixels evenly spread accross the image. The end result was still very good color matching at a fast pace.

I hope to have a little program available tomarrow for you to try out. If you want to prepare for the beta test, make sure you have all of your images available in one folder. Also, you may want to go out and find some colorful things to photograph. I found that I lacked some color in my portfolio.

Tags: Montage, Software, Photography, Programming, Graphics, Beta

Interview Me!

2005-09-04T18:09:00.000-04:00

This ... is a meme. The rules are quite simple and I suggest that you go ahead and read them and come back here if you would like to participate. My interviewer was Aurora Borealis.

1. I notice you have many varied interests, but what would you consider to be your one real passion in life?

I would have to say free spirited programming. There are no deadlines. There is no pressure. All that that I have is my enthusiasm to make something with my mind and a keyboard. All this is awesome, but the best part is that I can stop and go onto something else that catches my attention without any worries. Even the people at work compliment me on my passion to program.

2. Of all your electronic gadgets, which ones are so essential that you can't imagine life without them?

Does a computer count as a gadget? For a long time, I would have said my XM Radio. I would listen to it on my commutes and during work hours. The unit would go where I go and fit into all the accessories that I purchased for it. Ever since I got my free iPod, that has changed. Now I have radio on demand. I listen to what I want to listen to when I want to. I never realized an iPod would change my life so much or I would have gone out and purchased one a lot sooner.

3. If we find life on other planets, what would you hope we could gain from interaction with extraterrestrials?

Culture. Any time one civialization met up with another in our own past, culture was a very strong influence. It would be interesting to see what they eat, how the dress, what form of music they enjoy and what they do for fun. How do they travel to work? How is the political system structured? Do they have a form of currency? We could learn from them and adapt our own culture to benefit.

4. How do you think your everyday life will look ten years from now? Any significant changes?

There are always changes. 10 years ago, I did not exist. In my place was an entirely different set of cells accumulated into a human mass with the same identity under our government. 10 years from now, I will not exist - however the inventory of my soul will carry on and form the next "me". I think the next "Lewie" (let's call him #4) might be a manager in the field of technology, or perhaps even have a college education of some kind. If this isn't the case, then #4 will probably be retired somewhere in an RV crossing the country with my wife.

5. You may be my most loyal reader. What made you want to keep reading Atomic Bombshell?

Maybe it's that Bawidamann Pinnup. Not really, but I do enjoy the layout of a professionally done template. I keep comming back to Atomic Bombshell because the reads are pretty good. Since I list my favorite blogs in alphabetical order on my blogs sidebar, you are usually the first to read through since you update regularly. Last but not least, we tag each other with comments often enough through our blogs, image libraries, and other services that it is hard not to be loyal.

Tags: Interviews, Questions, Answers, Blogging, Memes

Atari Flashback

2005-09-03T22:10:00.000-04:00

What a busy day. I was awakened early and spent a while going through finances with my mother in-law. We headed on out and got all of our shopping done. By time we were done with everything, we had second thoughts about taking the kids to the Renaissance Festival. We were tired, it was hot, and finances would be much better when the next pay check rolls around.

To make up for it, we took the kids out to McDonald's and then headed on over to Toys 'R Us. I went outside and took many pictures of my niece in her princess outfit. She got changed and we all started playing hide-and-seek. After that, the kids and I were playing in the back yard and bugs started to come out so we went inside.

Earlier, I had picked up an Atari Flashback 2 system at Wal-Mart for roughly $30. It has 40 games built in and two joysticks. If you find yourself acquiring one of these things, the first thing you want to do is throw out the joysticks. They just don't work. You have to press the joysticks very hard in the direction you want to move. Fortunately I had 5 joysticks in the attic from my Atari 400 (God rest its' soul).

My niece started begging to play it as soon as I started getting things running. My nephew soon followed suit and they were occupied for hours. My mother in-law just looked at me and laughed. It was amazing to see these young kids get a kick out of playing the old games when they have the newer game consoles to choose from.

I'm all beat, but I've been told that they had just as much fun today as if they had actually gone to the Maryland Renaissance Festival. That's a relief and makes me feel all nice and happy.

Tags: Video Games, Family, Shopping, Finances

Photographic Montage

2005-09-03T02:07:00.000-04:00

So I had this idea tonight, but since I had company over, I couldn't work on it until everyone else went to sleep. Typing away as quickly as I could, I started looking through images on my computer. I made a program to put them all together to form "the big picture". Of course, the big picture (as always) is me.

It isn't perfect. But it is cool that I could figure out how to do it. I'm having problems with color information rite now. All of my images seem to be pieced together in gray scale. Any how, it is late and I have a big day ahead of me tomarrow.

Tags: Artwork, Programming, Photographs, Photography

Query Speeder

2005-09-02T15:59:00.000-04:00

I'm always making little programs every now and then to assist me in getting things done. Today I was working with a very complex query. Any modification to it could slow it down more. I had ways of testing the speed, but nothing practical.

Enter Query Speeder. This little utility lets me execute a batch of queries as many times as I specify. It prepares each command and executes it. It takes the average amount of time and displays it to the end-user as it runs.

Here are the guts of the program. Everything else is just the design and interacting with the registry.

47 private void OKButton_Click(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
48 {
49 this.CancelScripts = false;
50 this.OKButton.Enabled = false;
51 this.CancelScriptsButton.Enabled = true;
52 char[] trimChars = new char[]{' ', '\t', '\r', '\n'};
53 string[] sql = Regex.Split(SQLText.Text, @"\r\n\s*go\s*\r\n", RegexOptions.IgnoreCase);
54 for(int i = 0; i < sql.Length; i++)
55 sql[i] = sql[i].Trim(trimChars);
56 int executions = int.Parse(this.NumberOfExecutionsText.Text);
57 long TotalTicks = 0;
58 this.progressBar1.Maximum = executions;
59
60 SqlConnection Connection = null;
61 SqlCommand Command = null;
62 try
63 {
64 Connection = new SqlConnection(this.ConnectionStringText.Text);
65 Connection.Open();
66 Command = Connection.CreateCommand();
67 for(int n = 0; n < executions; n++)
68 {
69 for(int i = 0; i < sql.Length; i++)
70 if(sql[i] != null && sql[i].Length != 0)
71 {
72 if(this.CancelScripts) return;
73 Command.CommandText = sql[i];
74 Command.Prepare();
75 long start = DateTime.Now.Ticks;
76 Command.ExecuteNonQuery();
77 TotalTicks += DateTime.Now.Ticks - start;
78 }
79 TimeSpan span = TimeSpan.FromTicks((long)((float)TotalTicks / (float)(n+1)));
80 TimeResults.Text = string.Format("{0:00}:{1:00}:{2:000}", span.Minutes, span.Seconds, span.Milliseconds);
81 this.progressBar1.Value = n+1;
82 Application.DoEvents();
83 }
84 }
85 catch(Exception ex)
86 {
87 MessageBox.Show(this, ex.Message + "\r\n\r\n" + ex.StackTrace, ex.GetType().ToString());
88 }
89 finally
90 {
91 if(Command != null)
92 {
93 Command.Dispose();
94 Command = null;
95 }
96 if(Connection != null)
97 {
98 if(Connection.State != ConnectionState.Closed)
99 Connection.Close();
100 Connection.Dispose();
101 Connection = null;
102 }
103 this.progressBar1.Value = 0;
104 this.OKButton.Enabled = true;
105 }
106 }

Tags: SQL, Performance, Databases, Software, Programming, Source Code

First annual Blogiversary

2005-09-02T00:50:00.000-04:00

It is hard to believe it. I've been posting to my blog for one year now. I have posted 1202 entries to be exact.

Blogging has helped me keep track of what is going on in my life. I find myself searching my blog often for information that I know is there.

Being a fellow blogger, I have found out about interesting offers to get many good deals and offers. I even got a free iPod, a T-Shirt, a $100 bill, and a Rio Forge MP3 Player.

News travels fast around the blogosphere. I have caught on to a lot of different viewpoints over the past year. It has helped keep my mind active and open.

People are everywhere I turn, but friendship builds through networking with those bloggers. I have a few friends that I am loyal to reading there blogs out of habbit. In turn, they read through mine. We share our comments regarding each entry.

I have developed a few tools to assist me in this hobby. The Technorati Tagger seems to be the most popular out of all of them. Others on the internet have benefitted from and praised them as well.

Of course, it hasn't always been a happy blog. I've dragged my readers along with my depression and hard times. I considered giving up more then once. I've always rebounded out of it and stuck with blogging on a daily basis.

My entries are diversified on many subjects. I can only wonder what the next year will bring. I've created many seperate blogs covering specific topics, but this is the main blog that I've always stuck with. My best advice that I can pass onto you is simply "Blog what you know". I know myself best, and therefore I blog about me and my interests.

Happy Blogging!

Tags: Blogiversary, Blogging, Milestones, Blog

My first interview

2005-09-01T21:30:00.000-04:00

Ok, today wasn't really my first interview. Today was the first day that I sat on the other end of the table. I've been a little worried about it for a week. Many questions are buzzing in my head. Will I make a good impression? Will I know what to ask? My wife thought that I was crazy as I got ready this morning. "Usually it's the person being interviewed that is like this", she would say.

I guess I'm making a big thing out of nothing. I just feel so out of place. I read over the resume a few more times and jotted down a list of categories that I wanted to cover.

I went on into one of the conference rooms and did my thing. Looked at the clothes, the stature, did the handshake ... Of course, that isn't the interview. I talked with the guy about the wide range of technical things that I wanted to find out from him.

After we had finished talking I went over to get my coworker to talk to him. She was surprised that I had completed my task so quickly. I was a little shocked. I was wondering what more that I may have done wrong. I had gathered enough information to get a feel for his technical knowledge and form an opinion.

Tags: Interviews, Work, Job Interviews, Resumes

I got some credit

2005-09-01T20:01:00.000-04:00

After switching the classic Seti@Home client over to BOINC this past weekend, I finally got some credit approved. My results are now showing up in some of the major BOINC statistics websites. Since this has happened, I now have a nice little graphic to show off. Yay!

I've also been trying to get the synergy signature to start working as well. It seems to keep giving me a boken image icon. Hopefully it will eventually show itself. Compared to most other image signatures, it looks pretty cool.

I'm debating if I should join back up with some of the other projects or just stick with Seti@Home and Einstein@Home. My computers seem to do well with Einstein because the work units are small like SETI's.

Anyhow, that is all I have to say about that.

BOINC Stats

BOINC Stats Counters by Neil Munday

BOINC Synergy

Tags: Seti@Home, BOINC, Statistics, Grid Computing, Distributed Computing

First Referral for Free XBox 360

2005-09-01T00:03:00.000-04:00

I just checked out my xbox 360 account and saw that someone had completed there offer. Now I just need seven more of my friends to complete an offer as well. So I'll just go on and explain the program and hope for the best.

What you do is sign up and complete an offer. Most offers require the use of a credit card, but give you a free trial with no obligation. I signed up for a trial to Audible. Audible is a service that provides audio books that I listen to on my iPod when I commute to and from work.

It may take a few days before your offer registers as being complted. Different offers take different amounts of time to register. Also, before you complete an offer, you'll have to verify your email address as well. After that, it is as simple as giving a referral link to your friends to sign up.

Some of you may be skeptical. I was skeptical about another offer by the same company for a free iPod. I went with the program anyway. Sure enough, after I got all of my referrals, I got my free iPod in the mail.

Tags: Xbox, Xbox 360, Video Games, Free

Blog Day 2005

2005-08-31T21:36:00.000-04:00

I found out through Atomic Bombshell that apparently today (August 31st) is a special day for bloggers. It is called Blog Day. It is up to us bloggers to find 5 new blogs that are not so much like our own blog, and present them to our viewers. This in turns helps get the blogosphere connected even tighter and introduces people to new blogs.

I'm not too sure about the "new" part, but here are 5 blogs regardless. They are not so much like my own, so have some fun and check them out. Just remember to come back after you're done.

One thing that I thought was interesting was the logo "Blog". It is actually the number 3108 wich in turn is the 31st day of the of 8th month. This reminds me of hacker/gamer text known as leet speak.

Tags: BlogDay2005, BlogDay, Holiday, Blogging, Blog, Blogosphere, Blogs, 3108

Grid Computing

2005-08-31T00:48:00.000-04:00

Well, I pretty much have all of my computers setup with the new BOINC client and connected to the Seti@Home project. Seti is used to search for alien communication from space with data gathered from the Arecibo radio telescope in Puerto Rico. My Mac G3 can't support it with the version of Mac OS X that I have installed on it. On top of that, the Mac is giving me a few problems by loading up firefox instead of showing my system. (What gives?)

Anyhow, most of the seti services services appears to have just come online today (specifically the scheduler) after a week of downtime. My clients were finally able to connect and identify themselves on the project. Oddly enough, each computer that I have shows up with duplicate entries.

Due to the large amount of traffic, I am having trouble downloading anything from seti with boinc. The statistics on the seti@home project were pretty high today as many overdue work units from other clients were returned for credits.

In the mean time, I have joined up with the Einstein@Home project. I figure that I'll at least have my computers do something with there idle time. Einstein looks for spinning neutron stars. Data is collected from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational wave Observatory (LIGO) here in the states. Data is also collected from the GEO 600 Gravitational wave Observatory over in Germany. As with the seti project, I found that the Einstein project also had a team called "Computer Sciences Corporation". I joined the team but I will not show up as an active member until my pending credits are granted. You take a look at my einstein@home profile for some information about my participation.

I tried a project called climateprediction.net that downloaded a large amount of files. It is used to predict weather conditions. The work unit was so large, that my boinc client estimated that it would be completed within 60 days. Most of the einstein@home work units take 5 hours on my machine. I stopped the climateprediction.net project and deleted it.

There are many other boinc projects too, but so far Einstein is the most accessable for me. Hopefully seti will work itself out soon. Two other well known project appear to be
LHC@Home and Predictor@Home.

Tags: SETI, BOINC, SETI@Home, Science, Aliens, Super Computers, Distributed Computing, Einstein@Home, Installations, Space, Stars, Observatories, Gravity, Radio Telescopes, Arecibo, Puerto Rico, Weather, Einstein, Grid Computing

Every link is relative

2005-08-30T16:23:00.000-04:00

I ran into some problems when QA sent back a bug regarding links that only had "http", "http:", "http:/" and "http://" entered. Odd results would come back. After some researching, I found the following.

http - attempts to goto a directory within the current page location. (same as "http://domain.com/http" if you are looking at "http://domain.com/page.htm")
http: - goes to the current page that you are looking at. (same as ".")
http:/ - goes to the root domain you are linked to (same as "/")
http:// - theoretically goes to the root of the internet - but since a website is not located for the root of the internet, the browser does nothing.

All links are relative to the internet, yes? It was just interesting to see how it worked out. The classic problem came up where users enter "www.google.com", but the webserver just returned a message that said the page wasn't found. Of course, they forgot to enter the protocol, so the browser would interpret it as "http://mydomain.com/www.google.com".

Tags: Http, Internet, Links, Html

Google Talks. So what?

2005-08-29T12:59:00.000-04:00

So now Google has released its own IM software. This isn't anything big as we have had services from AOL, ICQ, Microsoft, Yahoo and Skype for many years now. The media seems to be making a big deal out of Googles ability to talk to people over the internet with a microphone. I don't see why this is big. It's not as if Google is the first one to do this. Everyone has been doing this. The only big thing is that Google is joining everyone else.

Skype would probably be the best program for internet telephony, as it also provides the option to have a phone number so people can call you from a regular phone. Anyone can leave you voice mail if you pay for the service, and you can also dial out to regular phone numbers.

So what exactly is different with Google Talk? What is it that is cutting edge here?

Tags: Google, Talking, Telephony, Instant Messaging, Software

SETI@Home Boinc Upgrade

2005-08-29T02:53:00.000-04:00

My Seti Classic statistics show that I have completed 9,066 work units. I am comming very close to achieving the 10,000 work unit milestone. I have a few boxes that have worked long and hard on this. I am starting to fear that it is all for nothing.

I decided to give in and start looking at this "BOINC" client that the SETI@Home website has been advertising. BOINC is an accronym for Berkely Open Infrastructure for Network Computing. I logged in and found that I only have 6,209 SETI Classic work units credited to my account as of March 15, 2005. Ouch! I was under the impression that they wouldn't move the work units over until I actually created a BOINC account.

Well, I just spent some time removing all the sofware and services running on each computer such as the Seti@Home Service and Seti Queue. I also went ahead and saved a map of the locations of each work unit that I processed from the Seti Queue web interface. I think it only remembers the last 500 units.

I setup BOINC on each machine. One of the machines is running Windows 98 and will not run BOINC as a background service. I have to be logged in in order for it to work. The other machine has Mac OS X 10.2.8, but the BOINC client requires Mac OS X 10.3 or higher. I would like to upgrade to Mac OS X 10.4, but I don't have enough memory for it. Such a head ache.

On top of this, I am also finding out that there service is having problems this past week and will not come back online until after this weekend. It looks like I picked the wrong time to upgrade.

Anyway, here is a link to my new SETI@Home profile. I'm glad they switched to a white background. It is hard on the eyes to read a dark web page with bright text.

Tags: SETI, BOINC, SETI@Home, Science, Aliens, Super Computers, Distributed Computing

Telecommuting Dreams

2005-08-28T23:47:00.000-04:00

One day, I would like to travel around the country in an RV and telecommute to work. The road calls to me to go and see the sites around me. A trip to niagra falls would be great. To walk near by and feel the mist comming off of the falls would be breathtaking. I'd love to go to see the grand canyon, yellowstone park, a few cival war memorials, parks, dams, and the like. There is just so much out there.

Until then, I can only dream. Of course, I try to keep my dreams within reason. You can't have everything.

Tags: Dreams, Traveling, Telecommunting, Work, Vacations

Lewies new doo

2005-08-28T21:08:00.000-04:00

I need to interview a few people this week to help assist me with some of the programming and database work that I do. My hair has been pretty long. It has been a while since my last hair cut. It was a good reason as any to get it cut. Actually, it has been on my list of 43 things to do for a while now.

I went to the mall and walked into the Bubbles salon. Usually I have to wait a while before someone is ready. Today a woman was ready rite away.

I should have noticed the little things rite away. The woman soaped my hair three times before she was ready. Usually the staff does it once. Sometimes twice if they also use conditioner.

The trimming started to feel like it was taking much longer then usual. I started to realize that this woman wasn't going to use an electric shaver at all. Everything was done with scissors and something that looked like a half of a scissor set.

At the end, she used a hair dryer (wow electricity!), and blew away the hair. It must have been a fairly new technology because she started to burn my head with it when she started talking with her coworkers.

Anyways, I walked away with a doo that just wasn't too pleasing. I can at least say that I don't have a large amount of hair on my head anymore. It should help cut back on the amount of shampoo that I use to wash it.

Tags: Interview, Hair, Hair Cut, Hygene, Hair Salon, Bubbles Salon, Bubbles, Salon, Bad Hair

Lewis

2005-08-27T21:00:00.000-04:00

So I was starting to wonder about my own name, Lewis. What is the meaning behind the name of Lewis? The mystery of names is sometimes so powerful that you can not stop wondering about it. There was only one thing to cure this curiosity that I had about my name.

A common dictionary will state the following:

Lewis: A dovetailed iron tenon made of several parts and designed to fit into a dovetail mortise in a large stone so that it can be lifted by a hoisting apparatus. Also called lewisson.

I am not a thing, but it is a little funny to see Lewis in a dictionary. I was really happy to see that there wasn't some foul picture next to the term, as children often tease about. I did a little searching on the internet and found many different meanings for the name Lewis. Most meanings were of a famouse fighter or warrior.

Famouse or renowned fighter

(Teutonic) "famous war." Another form is Louie. Lewis is also an English adaptation of the Celtic Llewellyn. Heroic, self-sacrificing. He is inclined to be headstrong but has an unimpeachable sense of honour.

(German) Famous in Battle; famous warrior

(Old English) Famous Warrior

(Old German, French) renowned fighter.

(German) Famous Warrior

lonely, sad git, bit of a tosser

All seemed reasonable meanings for Lewis except the last one. It looked like a list of funny definitions of common names.

I also came accross a few links showing how to write my name in other languages. I found the Mayan and Elvish languages to be attractive and tried my hand at writing "Lewis" with them. I think I got a little carried away with the Mayan one.

Here are som links to the different languages that you can try out on your own.

Mayan Glyphs
Inuit (Eskimo)
Egyptian
Babylonian
Viking Runes
Chinease
Japanese
Hawaiian (Lewis is Kaulana and Lui.)
Elvish
Latin (Lewis Moten of US is Lodovico Moten)
Baybayin

Tags: Lewis, Names, Glyphs, Meanings, Mysteries, Definitions, Languages

Altered vision of pizza

2005-08-27T17:55:00.000-04:00

I got to watch last nights sci-fi channels Friday Night Lineup of Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, and Battlestar Galactica. Everything was fine. No problems at all. Today I turned on the television and all I get are weird colors. Each corner has an altered blue hue from the rest of the screen. People appear to be wearing pink shirts when they should be white. Even pizza isn't the same as it ever was. I miss pizza.

The television is only 5 years old. This isn't something that was gradually happening, as I was able to watch a clear picture last night. I thought that it may have been due to my sound system, but the system isn't close enough. If it was, the altered hues should have only been near the sound systems magnetic field rather then the four corners. At least I still got the soud.

Tags: Pizza, Vision, TV, Sci-Fi, Colors, Hues

The top 50 keywords

2005-08-27T13:51:00.000-04:00

Here is a list of the top 50 keywords people use to come to my blog. I've categorized most.

Italian Chandelier - 140

italian chandelier 91
Italian Chandelier position 28
italian chandelier sex position 13
"Italian Chandelier" 8

Warcraft - 222

world of warcraft add ons 79
World of Warcraft addons 63
World of Warcraft addiction 20
world of warcraft add-ons 17
World of Warcraft Add on 15
wow add ons 10
warcraft add ons 10
world of warcraft installation 8

DVD - 96

DVD-r vs DVD+r 58
dvd-r vs dvd+r 14
dvd-r vs. dvd+r 14
DVD+R vs DVD-R 10

Health - 59

stopped up ear 25
ear stopped up 14
super ventricular tachycardia 12
weight loss blogs 8

iPod - 97

griffin roadtrip review 24
iPod Flea Video 16
ipod car mount 14
ipod car mounts 13
ipod products 12
ipod car accessories 9
Ipod flea parody 9

Programming - 31

ExpandableObjectConverter 11
redim c# 10
redim in C# 10

Quizes - 66

hogwarts house quiz 17
napoleon dynamite quiz 13
white trash quiz 10
sorting quiz 9
hogwarts sorting quiz 9
iq 129 8

flash gear 52
snoop dog shizzolator 20
liquid ass 17
words men use 14
fisher wood stove 14
lego mini figures 12
great rack 11
cheap hdtv 9
jpgutils.dll 9
legend of earth sea 8
Skeet launcher 7
evil clown generator 7
jpgutils.dll 7
face generator 7

Tags: Keywords, Statistics, Top 50, Search

Raise your own meat, if you can

2005-08-26T02:55:00.000-04:00

My brother is a health nut. Actually, he's just a vegetarian. I check in on things from time to time about vegetarians, organic food and what not. I came accross an article advising how to be frugal about organic foods. There were some helpful tips to avoid the high priceson being frugal.

One tip that caught my eye was the following:

If you have room to raise your own meat, you can save even more.

I'll be the first to raise my hand and say that I'm a dirty thinker. I almost died laughing. Anyhow, my brother doesn't eat meat at all. Last I checked, that was pretty much the definition of a vegetarian.

The article went on with a few other tips. Some were "no-brainers". Others had me wondering what planet the auther was from. I'm sure my brother already considered most of these tips. Any how, for the rest of my readers, here is a summary of the tips:

By in bulk
Buy direct
Cook from scratch
Make your own soy milk and tofu
Grind grain for bread
Join a co-op
Buy uncertified food from farmers
Hunt for coupons on the internet
Grow your food

Tags: Brother, Health Nut, Vegetarian, Organic Food, Organic, Food, Tips, Frugal, Meat, Dirty Mind

Zombies are Real

2005-08-26T01:47:00.000-04:00

So I was watching a few videos on Kontraband and came accross one called Real Zombies. In the video, Darren Brown sais that he has had the game created to his specifications called Waking Dead. This special game is to make an attempt to cause someone who plays it to go into a catatonic trance.

The game is in a pub and he watches people from a control room. A guy comes up and starts playing. When he gets to a certain area, the video game starts emitting the flashes. After a few attempts, the guy finally goes into the trance.

Darren comes out with the movie cameras and drags the guy out of the pub and onto a stretcher. His two confused friends come along with him, no questions asked. He is carted over to the building accross the street. Spooky green and blue lighting is everywhere. Blood is smeared on glass, and the place is empty.

These guys get to a room where the game left off. They stand the guy up and put a gun in his hand. Then everyone hides in another control room to monitor everything. Zombies come out from everywhere. It is both funny and a little worrying with how this guy reacts. He goes crazy and trys to kill everyone. I think he just had a paint gun.

So in the end, he some how goes back into a catatonic trance. They cart him back to the pub and have everyone stand exactly how they were. The guy looks at his friend after waking up and admits that it is a really good game.

It was convincing, but there were just a few things that didn't seem rite.

Wouldn't he realize that the gun wasn't real? It wasn't making loud deafening noises, and it didn't look real. If a catatonic trance allows you to respond to suggestion where substitutes for reality are given, then perhaps that could explain it.

The whole "flashing lights" idea to make someone go into a catatonic trance was weird. The closest thing I have heard is people going into an epileptic seizure with flickering light patterns. Maybe I'm wrong on this, as this is the only thing I've heard about with epilepsy. If he was targeting people with epilepsy, that would be just wrong. What if the guy started having muscle spasms? What then?

When the guy wakes up in the bar, he just puts his gun down and laughs with his friends. Maybe Derren whispered a few things in the guys ear to suggest how he should feel. They didn't show any whispering though.

Tags: Zombies, Scary, Reality, Video Games, Fear, Catatonic Trance, Waking Dead, Arcade, Tricks, Staged Hoax, Darren Brown, Derren Brown

Benny Benassi's Satisfaction

2005-08-25T23:48:00.000-04:00

I listen to dance music pretty often. In fact, my favorite XM station is 81 BPM. One song that comes on every now and then is Satisfaction, by Benny Benassi. Angel started describing a song to me that she heard once and I knew rite away that this was that song. As I found it on my iPod, she got excited.

I keep telling her that she has to see the video because she'll crack up laughing. It looks like a commercial for heavy duty appliances. Anyhow, if she reads this post, then my deed is done.

Tags: Satisfaction, Benny Benassi, Dance, Music, XM Radio, Song, Video, Music Video, iPod, Angel, Link, Advertising

Sleepy Head

2005-08-25T22:35:00.000-04:00

So last night, I got home and made some dinner. After I was done, I went strait to bed. I don't remember waking up, but apparently I shut off my alarm this morning. I woke up this afternoon a little confused why it was after 12 and shocked that I didn't make it to work.

Life has just been very tireing lately. Most of the week I have gone into work, come home, sleep, and then wake up for an hour or two. I go back to sleep and wake up in time to leave for work.

I set on my bed, convincing myself that I need to go to work. There are so many reasons why I am needed to be there. All the more reason why I was shocked when I woke up today. The many things going through my head.

I feel almost like a zombie at work. I still get work done, but I just long for the trip back home so I can go back to bed.

The really weird thing is that there is nothing to be depressed about. Maybe I forgot what I was depressed about. It is just really hard to shake off.

Tags: Sleep, Tired, Depression, Work, Reasoning, Zombie, Trip, Bed, Depressed

Web Form in a Windows Form

2005-08-25T22:25:00.000-04:00

So it has been a while since I've worked on my programmers browser. I went ahead and got all of the different types of fields generated for a web form. These would be things like text fields, check boxes, radio buttons, text areas, image buttons, submit buttons and files.

I'm having some problems with the multi-select fields. They don't want to show up as being selected for a strange reason. Hopefully I can get that worked out later on.

The next part would be reading these values so that I can send them along with the request method. Soon I will be able to download and post my Sprint PCS pictures to my Flickr account without having to touch a computer.

Tags: Programming, Browser, Fields, Forms, Windows, Web, Troubleshooting, Sprint PCS, Flickr, Pictures, Moblog

Tagging Report Generation

2005-08-25T18:35:00.000-04:00

A few of you may have noticed that I have added tags to the bottom of many posts. Ever since Technorati started indexing tags, I've been really getting with the program and using them everywhere. I have even built my own little tagging utility. Tags are a way of letting technorati know what it is that I'm talking about.

I always wondered what it was that I talked about most. I threw together a little program and started generating a report. Below you will find a cloud of the 150 most used tags on my blog. The larget the tag is, the more I talk about it. You can also navigate through each tag by clicking the letter that it begins with. The tag itself will list all articles that have that tag.

Cloud | $ | . | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | A | Ã | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z
.Net Account Angel API Atom Atom API AtomAPI Auction Audio Birthday Blog blogger blogger.com Blogging Blogware Brother Browser C# Car Cash Cat CD Changes Cheap Chicken Childhood code Comment Computer Cook Data Database Depression Design Diet Dieting Dinner Download Driving Eat eBay Election email Family Finances flash Flickr Food Free Free iPod Friends fun Funny Game Games Goal Google Groceries Happy Holiday Home HTML humor Ideas images Information In-Law iPod LA Weight Loss Layout Lewie Lewis Life link List Love Lunch Mac Mail Manager Maryland Microsoft Milk Mom Money Mother Mother In-law Movie MP3 music Nephew News Niece Night Office Pain Phone Photo Photos Pictures POST President Problem Problems Programming Progress PS2 Questions Quiz Radio Review RPG RSS Screenshot Search Server Service Shopping Sick Sister Sister In-Law Sleep Software Statistics Stress Tags Template Test Testing Thanksgiving Time Tired Troubleshooting TV Upload VA Video Video Game Virginia Vote Walking Wal-Mart WarCraft website Weekend Weight Weight Loss Wife Work Xml

I'm having problems uploading everything through FTP. There are over 6,000 files to upload. I may have to reconsider how I am doing things and use ASP to dynamically generate the pages instead.

Tags: Technorati, Tagging, Blogware, Tags, Cloud, Search, Categories, Report, Report Generation, Navigation

So how fast is fast?

2005-08-24T00:52:00.000-04:00

I stumpled upon a website called Internet Frog that had an internet connection speed test. The results appeared to be real-time. I watched as the chart would update itself over 2 minutes and then gave me a summary of my results.

Download: 4,686,424 bps
Upload: 423,768 bps
QOS: 88%
RTT: 68 ms
MaxPause: 47 ms

So what does this all mean? I can' t (more like don't want to bother) make sense of what QOS, RTT, or MaxPause is all about. However, I do understand some of those numbers on the chart. It appears that my connection is almost as fast as a T2. I didn't realize the speed that I had. I always thought of cable modems to be around a T1 or just below it.

As long as I don't have to watch pictures load slowly, I'm happy.

Tags: Connection, Internet Connection, Internet, Speed Test, T1, T2, Internet Frog, Diagnostics, Speed, Fast, bps, RTT, QOS, MaxPause, Download, Upload

Eldest Audiobook

2005-08-23T22:53:00.000-04:00

I finished listening to the second half of the Eragon audio book today. I have been listening to it a lot over the weekend hoping to be done in time for the release of Eldest. I saw that Audible now lists Eldest in two volums for the second book. Each volume is split into two files for easier download. Eldest is 23 hours and 33 minutes long. Eragon was about a third less then that. It looks like the same person who read the first book (Gerard Doyle), is also reading the second book as well.

I applied my last book credit for this month to the first volume of Eldest. I have until September 9th before I can download the second volume with my replenished credits. I had run out of audio credits and I don't want to buy the volume out rite even if it is at half price. I still save about 75% by using book credits instead.

I wonder how long it will be until the final book of the Inheritance trilogy will be completed. I hope that Christopher Paolini doesn't get writers block. Dragons and Magic really catch my imagination and it thirsts for more.

Movie Rumors
As far as the movie goes for Eragon, I'm starting to see rumors of actors being cast. Ed Speleer has signed on as Eragon. I've also heard rumors in other places that Eragon will be played by Garrett Hedlund. Sienna Guillory will play the part as Arya. Other actors will be Djimon Hounsou, Jeremy Irons, and John Malkovich.

Tags: Eldest, Eragon, Audio Book, Audible, Inheritance, Trilogy, Dragons, Magic, Imagination, Book, Gerard Dyle, Christopher Paolini, Writers Block, Credit, Ed Speleer, Garrett Hedlund, Sienna Guillory, Arya, Djimon Hounsou, Jeremy Irons, John Malkovich, Rumors, Movies

This completes todays broadcast

2005-08-21T19:07:00.000-04:00

Have you ever walked through life not knowing who you were supposed to be or what you were supposed to be doing? You know that you are good at a few things, but does it really matter? Things continue to tire you out and it makes you wonder what the point of it all is. I'm beginning to feel like a television station at the end of the broadcasting cycle.

Of course, television isn't much different. It pretty much continues the next day to do everything over again and again yielding the same results, but expecting different ones. Some would say that that is the definition of insanity.

The question I ask myself, is what exactly is it that I am expecting? What more do I want out of life? I continue to think about infinite possibilities to change my life, along with the consequences and the things that prevent me from doing so. In the end, there is no other choice. Worn out, tired and exhausted, I continue to go on with who I am and what I do best.

Maybe I just need a time out. The problem is that no matter what I do, I can't seem to get one. I do get my vacations, but they are only vacations at home in a period when I am broke and can't do anything. I long for a vacation away from it all. I hear of everyone else going away to exotic locations or doing really fun things. It just makes me all the more depressed longing for my next vacation week, but realizing that it will only be a long weekend at home.

Tags: Life, Questions, Pondering, Thinking, Soul Searching, Vacation, Television, Broadcasting, Depression, Tired, Burnt Out, Worn Out, Who Am I, Expectations, Possiblities, Consequences, Exhausted

Quick Recap

2005-08-20T23:14:00.000-04:00

Woke up and started converting a few sorting algorithms from Java to C#. I thought about it and realized there was no reason to do so, so I just deleted the project.

I tried playing a few free games online. Most are just not that great. It isn't inspiring at all when I want to make one on my own.

Went to get gas for the car, lawn mower, and weed wacker. Got to the pump and reached for cash but didn't have any. Looked for my card and couldn't find it. Went back home.

Watched Constantine. Really good movie. I like movies that file the bible under the Science Fiction category. Really cool stuff.

Found my card in my wallet and got gas. Tried to cut the lawn but ran into some problems and stopped.

Watched a few South Park episodes, took a shower, blogged.

The End.

Tags: Sorting Algorithms, Java, C#, Programming, Games, Online, Free, Lawn Mower, Gas, Car, Weed Wacker, Constantine, Movie, Bible, Science Fiction, South Park, Shower, Blogged, Recap

Funny "butt" odd commericals

2005-08-19T23:17:00.000-04:00

So I was watching the Friday night lineup on the Sci-Fi channel tonight like I always do. First comes Stargate SG-1, then Stargate Atlantis, and finally Battlestar Galactica comes on. It's really good entertainment for three hours and gives me something to look forward to each week.

One thing that I keep noticing is one of there station identification commercials. This well dressed guy takes a little dog and blows into its bum. The force of air going through its anus causes the dogs ears to blow up like a balloon, followed by its head and body.

I don't know whether to think of this video as beastiality, animal cruelty, or just plain odd. I like to see someone play with balloons, but not in this way. The balloon dog certainly doesn't like it because he kicks the man towards the end after he has turned into a balloon animal.

I find it to be a little disturbing. Who came up with this idea to blow in a dogs rectum? Are they seeking professional help? It is odd how the Sci-Fi channel continues to show the station signature over and over again. They have plenty of others that are really good and I wouldn't mind if they cut this one out of the loop.

Tags: Sci-Fi, SciFi, Sci-Fi Channel, Science Fiction, Dog, Puppy, Anus, Butt, Balloon, Balloon Animals, Disturbing, SG-1, Stargate, Stargate SG-1, Stargate Atlantis, Atlantis, Battlestar Galactica, Galactica

A long day at work

2005-08-18T01:29:00.000-04:00

So this is what the end of a long day at work looks like. No one else is parked in the garage but me. This happends often. Fortunately we have security cameras and if I'm paranoid enough, I can ask the security officer to walk me to my car.

I usually decline to ask for an escort. After all, I'm a guy. Unless the statistics of rape predators have changed, there isn't much that I need to worry about except a robbery or death. I prefer the robbery.

I've been working on a few projects at work, but there is one that I'm really trying to get the ball rolling on. I'm doing database work, business logic, and some stuff on the front end.

Many things are going on while I'm helping out two co-workers who are depending on me to get things done quickly. As soon as I get parts done, they can get there parts done. It is a lot of stuff to get done all at once. To help speed things up, I stay later so I can get more work done.

Well, it is already way past my bed time so I'm going to go ahead and take a quick nap.

Tags: Work, Late, Long Day, Projects, Pressure, Get The Ball Rolling, Escort, Rape, Statistics, Predators, Robbery, Death, Worry, Security

Discovering Inheritance

2005-08-17T22:12:00.000-04:00

Every Tuesday, iTunes has a few free downloads. It started with just two songs in the sections of "Single of the Week" and "Discovery Download". Every now and then a "Street Official Mixtape" will come out as well.

Last week, a new type of download was added for an audio book "Rotton School". Actually, it was a song done for the audio book and it was bad. This weeks audio book was "Eldest" from the Inheritance trilogy. This shocked me a little because I had just helped my mother in-law order the book through the Science Fiction Book Club. We tried earlier in the month, but it wasn't available yet.

I started to give it a listen. It was chapter 1 - "A twin disaster", about some dwarves comming out of a cave and being slaughtered by Urgals. The main character, Eragon, was desperately running to try and help them, but they fell before him. It was a pretty sad setting. The music and the emotion in the story tellers voice really made it very good.

Something that triggered some happiness was realizing that this book was offered by Audible. I have an account over there with two book credits. I searched for Eldest, but it wasn't listed yet. I looked for the first book instead - "Eragon". Sure enough, they had it for $28.97. Since I get two book credits a month in my subscription, I could cut that price in half. I went ahead and applied one of my credits and downloaded it to my iPod.

I listened to the audio on the way into work. It was a different person reading and there wasn't any music. I didn't care at all for the reader, but the story was amazing. Alagaesia was a new world opening up to my imagination of infinate possiblities. It had me thinking throughout the day what would happen next. I saved that for my commute back home.

The ride home I found that a blue stone with white veins that the character had found was actually a dragon egg. I listened as the dragon grew rapidly and started forming a telepathic bond with Eragon. I was so into the story that I had a driveway moment. It's just that good. I see that the movie is listed in the IMDb as being filmed, but I can't help but wonder if it might be a joke.

Normally, I would have just waited to buy the book or ask mom if I could borrow hers when was is done. Lately, it's been hard to make time and read books. I only got through book 5 of Harry Potter because I was commuting on a one hour bus ride to and from work each way. Today I drive to work and The Half-Blood Prince is setting on a desk in my room. It is untouched and waiting for my eyes. The J. K. Rowling books aren't listed on Audible. The closest thing that you can find is Barry Trotter and the Unauthorized Parody.

I find that most audio books that I prefer usually deal in the realm of magic and fantasy. It's like reading a few really good RPG campaigns rite after the other without having to roll for damage. I am the character in the story for those brief moments of listening pleasure.

My iPod also has this nice feature in that I can speed up or slow down the speed of the reader. I find that speeding up the book actually helps me comprehend what is going on easier. Another reason why I love my iPod is chapters. If the iPod ever loses memory of where I left off, I can just skip ahead to the next chapter placemark. Oh how I love that feature. I would hate having to scan through 15 hours of audio without it.

Tags: iTunes, Audio Books, Eldest, Rotton School, Inheritance Trilogy, Inheritance, Science Fiction Book Club, Book Club, Science Fiction, Sci-Fi, Urgals, Dwarves, Eragon, Audible, iPod, Alagaesia, Dragons, Dragon Egg, Driveway Moments, Harry Potter, The Half-Blood Prince, Half-Blood Prince, Potter, Harry, Barry Trotter, Unauthorized Parody, RPG, Magic, Fantasy, Chapters

Renewing my identity

2005-08-17T18:00:00.000-04:00

I work with software on websites that request client certificates. The reason for this is to promote the single-sign-on ability of our software over secure connections. It works out really well too, I might add.

After I had setup a database on a demonstration laptop, I tried to test the software to verify the installation was successful. I kept getting complaints that my certificate was either invalid or expired. I went ahead and setup the software to trust the issuing authority of my certificate and I still had the same message.

Has it been a year already? Well, I paid a visit to thawte and sure enough my personal certificate had expired 3 days ago. I tried exporting some of the internal certificates I had been assigned, but I didn't have the option to do so. Also, it was kinda late and the person who responsible for issuing internal certificates was not available.

I made a request for my certificate to be renewd. I saw the status of pending and got a little worried that I wouldn't be able to get it tonight. After five minutes, it was available and I was happy. I installed it, exported it, and imported it to the laptop. I tested our software and it worked! Oh, the little joys of life ...

Tags: Thawte, Security, Troubleshooting, Installation, Software, SSL, https, Certificates, Expiration, Work

Dynamic Web Forms in Windows Forms

2005-08-16T20:59:00.000-04:00

I have been working a lot on this little application over the weekend, but I am having a tough time getting things done over the week. I was able to start transforming controls onto a windows form. Rite now I can handle two input types of "text" and "hidden". I think the radio and checkboxes will be hard ones to take care of. Actually, a radio button is going to be the hardest due to grouping.

It doesn't look like much, but here you go ...

Tags: .Net, Programming, Screen Scraping, Form, Web, Blogware

Car Insurance

2005-08-15T23:20:00.000-04:00

Today I switched my auto insurance to Allstate. Ok, actually I found out this past weekend that I didn't have car insurance. So what better time to get new car insurance?

I had been paying about $130 per month for limited liability insurance with Progressive. I decided to go with All State since I already have my home owners policy with them. They give you a discount if you have existing policies with them.

So I was setting in the office looking at some of the advertisements. Most were for life insurance. I was reminded of Jim Carrey in The Truman Show when he visited a travel agent and saw posters of planes crashing on the walls. There were statistics like "For every 300 Allstate customers that die each day, 173 don't have life insurance". Lots of stuff about death and dieing with morbidly funny humor.

So the guy was punching numbers for so long I asked if he was actually playing solitaire or something. It turns out that he didn't realize that I was married from a previouse comment I had made and was changing my information in the system.

The agent started to frown and said "uh oh". He found my brothers ex-wife in the system and asked me if she was my wife. Um ... no. Apparently his ex has a few files in the system from her beast of a car.

In the end, with all the discounts, he was able to get me down to $512 for six months. That is a significant drop compared with Progressive.

I always saw advertisments for insurance such as Geico and such, but was always fearful of change. I figured I would be paying for two insurance policies at the same time, or that I would have to wait for one to expire first. There was always the consideration that the new policy would want a full payment up front.

What ever the case, everything is taken care of now. I'm saving much more on my car insurance now. I paid 30% of the 6 month policy along with a $30 fee.

Tags: Car, Auto, Automobile, Insurance, Auto Insurance, Allstate, Progressive, Geico, Policy, Morbid Humor

Where everyone forgets your name

2005-08-15T19:16:00.000-04:00

Mr. Bill Gates is giving me a hard time again. He has a tool that developers use called Visual Studio .Net. I use this tool to design databases and program software.

For the past few days, I've been noticing something funny. Every time I open a collection of data stored in a table, the name of the table no longer appears on the diagram pane, but is replaced with an alias of Table_1. I also notice that I have missing columns as well. Everything just seems to have just dissappeared.

Being the Sql Junkee that I am, I can program just fine and quickly without using the diagram. However, it does come in handy sometimes.

I can usually google for some troubleshooting information. I know that I have had this problem in the past, but I don't know how I got around it.

Tags: Sql, Microsoft, Visual Studio .Net, .Net, Programming, Troubleshooting, Views, Database, Diagram, Architecture, Tables, Columns, Missing, Awol, Disappear, Vanish

The Blogger Code

2005-08-15T00:07:00.000-04:00

Although I blog every day, there is so much stuff on the blogosphere that I just don't know about. Tonight I found out about The Blogger Code from watson. He had a small portion of what looked to be gibberish on his side bar. I followed the link beside it and came upon the blogger code website.

So after a quick little survey (after all, that is all this code really is), I received the following code:

B4 d+ t- k+ s++ u-- f+ i o x- e+ l c--

So what does it mean?

I've been blogging for 9-12 months. I own 2 or more domains, but only one is updated regularly. I just bought the other domain(s) because I made up a cool name. I use Blogger, BigBlogTool, or similar service to update a blogspot, Geocities, or other hosted site; or I use diaryland, livejournal, or another service with built-in updating and content management. I have quite a few links, and I try to check in on them all regularly, or at least periodically. I check my stats at least once a day, I keep my tables in a spreadsheet, and I can tell you my average daily and monthly visitors without having to look it up. I don't link to, nor read, any of the standard A-list blogs (Megnut, Kottke, Robot Wisdom, etc.). In fact, I've never heard of 'em. I post at least once a day. I can't remember the last day I haven't blogged. I blog from either home or work, but only after my work is done and when I get some free time. My entries are a mix of some original material, some web links, and links and comments about other blogs. I might flirt a little with other bloggers, but anything beyond that is out of the question. I have posted quite a few photos of myself, but I was fully clothed in them all, thankyouverymuch. I've taken a few surveys or participated in a few memes, but there seem to be so many of them I have to pick and choose. Nearly all of my offline friends, family members, and co-workers know about my blog, and that's fine.

Tags: Code, Blogger Code, The Blogger Code, Survey, The Code, Blogging

More Progress on Screen Scraping

2005-08-14T23:44:00.000-04:00

I just finished up parsing and deserializing form fields into html controls. Beautiful isn't it? When you select the form that you wish to post with in the "Forms" tab, the "Fields" tab is populated with the available fields.

The next part is to allow someone to edit these fields with a nice clean interface. If I click a button, I want to see drop down boxes for my "select" elements, radio buttons, check boxes, file uploads, text areas, and more. Ok, it is really just for me - but I'm sure that someone else would really appreciate it as well.

It is a hard journey ahead, but I've got some crazy ideas that just might work. In a few days, I think I'll be able to download those images from Spring PCS in no time. Maybe I can get this thing to generate some script for me as well. It would make it all that much easier to code against the web agent in future projects.

Tags: Screen Scraping, Progress, Programming, Html, Parsing, Browser, Programmers Browser, .Net, C#, Blogware

Salt, Salt, Salt. Gotta have more salt!

2005-08-14T19:55:00.000-04:00

So a few months back, my wife and I invested in a water conditioning system for a few thousand dollars. After the first month, we were supposed to replenish the main system with salt pellets of some kind.

I had been keeping my eyes open for these pellets while shopping. Sometimes I've actively looked for the pellets first before I did my shopping if I wasn't pressed for time.

I would look near water filtration systems. I'd look near water filters. I even looked around areas stocked with bottled water. I would also look in the plumbing section. The problem is, I didn't know exactly what I was looking for.

Today my mother in-law was helping me do some shopping and she decided to start looking for it. We turned down an aisle in the paint section and a Wal-Mart employee was walking towards us. So we asked him where we could find such a product. The man looks down to his left and points.

A giant pallete under shelves with cans of paint had plenty of giant yellow bags. They were exactly what we were looking for. I slowly dragged one of the bags out. The things weighed fourty pounds each. It turns out that it was less then five dollars for the bag.

Why didn't I ever think to look in the paint section? This just makes me want to take it out on them. Still, I don't think I would have found it even if I did look in that section. I was expecting to find a small box or bag of this stuff.

Tags: Water, Filter, Water Softener, Water Softener Pellets, Water Filter, Morton, Soft Water, Hard Water, Pellets, Softener Pellets, Morton System Saver Pellets, Water Conditioning, Conditioning, Water Treatment, Water Treatment System, Shopping, Salt, Wal-Mart, Walmart

Screen Scraping Application Progress

2005-08-14T19:35:00.000-04:00

So I've worked on my application a little more. First, I added an extra tab so that I could see a text-only version of the web page. This also gives me an idea of how search engines see page content.

One major change was behind the sceens. Rather then just returning a NameValueCollection of links, I decided to refector the code to return an array of HtmlAnchor controls instead. Since the .Net framework already has objects to represent links, I figure this should be better in case I need to add any other information later on. This closely comes in line with parsing forms.

Forms have a greater deal of information then just a name and a value. Rather then making my own objects from scratch, I turned to the HtmlForm object that comes in the System.Web.UI.HtmlControls namespace. Forms are very important with screen scraping. You must sometimes go through authentication before you are permitted access to the content.

At the moment, I got so far as to return an array of form elements. I even got the relative addresses translated correctly as well. The next step is to start parsing different input fields, text areas, and select boxes. Parsing alone is going to be a big problem. The toughest challenge that I see is to render a dynamic form for the end-user to modify data.

Tags: Programming, Programmers Browser, Web Browser, Browser, Http, Parsing, Links, Forms, Blogware, Progress

Parsing Links with .Net

2005-08-14T01:11:00.000-04:00

This little utility that I'm making with .Net is actually starting to become very useful. You could actually go so far as to say that it is a programmers browser. I've made some expressions to parse out the links on a page and list them. Even relative urls are properly converted.

The next big issue for me is to start parsing out those forms and all the fields that are available for them. That one is going to be tricky. Maybe I should use a tree-view control for it.

Tags: Programming, Programmers Browser, Web Browser, Browser, Http, Parsing, Links, Regular Expressions, Regex, Blogware, Progress

Google Logo Maker

2005-08-13T23:53:00.000-04:00

Logogle your name! Enter any text you want and Logogle will make a search page for you with a Google-Style name on it. Thanks to Da Taste for pointing this one out to me.

Tags: Logo, Google, Google Hacks, Logo Maker, Search, Text, Font, Style, Googled

I'm doing something rite

2005-08-13T23:34:00.000-04:00

I figured out the cookie part of my little web agent application. I'm also reading headers properly as well. I'm almost ready to take on Sprint PCS and download my pictures.

Tags: Sprint PCS, Automation, Web Agent, Http, Programming, Blogware, Progress