Another interesting video from the Google folks. A worthy video of anyone’s time who works in groups, but more so those who deal with rolling out projects. Grab a cup of coffee, and enjoy… someday I will figure out how to download these (is that a contrary to these online video distribution sites?) videos so that I can watch them on the plane. Maybe the functionality already exists, I shall have to look – if anyone knows of a way please add a comment.
Thanks to Josh Simons for pointing me to this video from his post.
So, I have been a videophile for a longtime and greatly desire to have my digital media made available to my television. I have tried connecting my PC and my Mac to the televisions, and despite the functional usage it is not elegant nor likely to last given the extreme manual effort (and the incredible overkill of using a $$$ multi-gigabyte and multi-processor machine) to do what a $50 dvd player from WaloMart.
Apple iTV is close to being the perfect solution except for two concerns – 720p is a bit weak in quality for my movie playing enjoyment, and what about my non-itunes media? The hard drive size is a bit small too – considering a single movie can be several gigs in size.
Crafty folks have gotten iTV to boot on a MacBook:
It seems that some brilliant folks have determined a way to upgrade the hard, and the ability to run divx files. So, is there any hope for upgrading the HD output to 1080? I will keep my eyes out, and this may be the straw that broke my self-control (2 out of 3 addressed – play any files, upgraded hard drive and only lacking on the HD output).
If anyone has any new upgrades or mods, please add them below. I will update this post as I find new information.
One thing that would be incredible and maybe really enhance the experience would be to place the appletv os on a mac mini. Greater drive size, more horsepower, better graphics card (?), better expandability… albeit more expensive.
Yesterday, Sunday, Jill and I completed our second half-marathon. The race was the ING Inaugural Georgia Marathon-Half-Marthon here in Atlanta GA. Overall they did a great job, except for the lack of structure at the start. The start was huge blob of runners (marathoners and half-marathoners and walkers merged into one huge block) that spanned over 5 city blocks. The problem was we were stuck in the back of the pack, and there were a huge number of walkers. Jill and I spent the first 3 miles weaving around this group, and finally around mile 4 hit a really quick pace.
Our time finished at 2 hours and 3 minutes which averages around 9:23. This was faster than our goal, but does not do justice to our race, because we were cruising at a great clip. Moving forward we will be switching to cycling with some running during the week.
The race is scheduled to start at 7am (we will send an update on Saturday if we hear different), and we will cross the finish line a wee bit before 9am (optimistically) – we’ve been training for a 9 minute mile.
For those that cannot make it to the race at 7am there is (geek heaven) an online tracking system that shows our progress throughout the course. Technical info: We will be wearing RFID tags and as we cross certain points in the race they will update their live race map. Here is the link
This weekend we decided Crown Molding in the first floor bathroom would really enhance its look and feel. It also made it consistent with the rest of the downstairs. So, armed with YouTube, a few home improvements sites, a magazine, a Ridgid mitre saw, air gun, an Angle Projector, and two dogs I got the molding cut and up on the wall with no major issues. Of course measuring and cutting are only half the battle, the real talent comes with chalking and painting to make two generally flush pieces of wood look like a single clean piece. Total project time was 5.5 hours.
Overall the only tips I would impart are:
Make test pieces!! These were by far the best validation of the angles needed for each corner
When you purchase the wood it will say the angle it is cut for (this will make sense after you read up on this process), and then simply set your mitre saw w/ bevel edge – done
Find and mark the studs on the wall and the joists – no fun making extra holes while balancing on a ladder with a 7 foot piece of wood ‘perfectly’ placed on the wall and thumbing around for the trigger on the nail gun.
Here are the sites I referenced that I thought were helpful in this process:
Site 1 – good tutorial site, small pics, decent text
A teacher at AHS put together a neat presentation to communicate the shift of growth in both technology and the world population. The presentation is online and super fast to go through, but the data points are very surprising and he has provided sources to demonstrate their validity. Take a look. My favorite point is that “teachers today are teaching students to solve problems that do not exist using technology that has not been invented”.
The other day, a special day, I received a cool gift from my sister. A Moka Express – specifically a Bialetti. In case you are unfamiliar with this classic stovetop espresso maker here is a small picture and wiki link.
Despite the lack of instructions my first cafe was excellent with the illy coffee I had lying around the house (never know when you are going to want to make an expresso!). I did find a few good sites that help walk the newbie through brewing this cup of joe.
I have been enjoying my MacBook for nearly 8 months now and despite some initial hardware challenges (2 lemons, but Apple promptly switched them out in the first 15 days) life has been great. One thing that I have been relying upon is the use of Parallels, the Mac virtual environment that allows me to run Windows while working in the Mac.
I had a recent rash of challenges trying to print through a USB device in Parallels, and till today was stuck. The solution – Bonjour (Provided by Apple). Here is the link to the discussion on Parallels on how to tweak it for your environment.
End of the day – simple, it works, and it is free – beautiful.
James
After-all – this is the whole point of the internet, share and save time through experiences and collaboration.
Yesterday, Sunday, Jill and I completed our second half-marathon. The race was the ING Inaugural Georgia Marathon-Half-Marthon here in Atlanta GA. Overall they did a great job, except for the lack of structure at the start. The start was huge blob of runners (marathoners and half-marathoners and walkers merged into one huge block) that spanned over 5 city blocks. The problem was we were stuck in the back of the pack, and there were a huge number of walkers. Jill and I spent the first 3 miles weaving around this group, and finally around mile 4 hit a really quick pace.
The other day, a special day, I received a cool gift from my sister. A Moka Express – specifically a Bialetti. In case you are unfamiliar with this classic stovetop espresso maker here is a small picture and 
