everything ray

Why I hate iTunes

2010-04-03T08:01:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time I remember telling someone how much I hated iTunes. The only problem was I couldn't remember all the reasons. So I'm going to keep a list here:

I am forced to use it for certain things like using my airport and iphone- there aren't many if any other options.

They always try to force feed my computer safari and some other mobileme software when I do an update. And it seems to update more than I actually use the program. As if that isn't enough it wants me to reboot when it updates... it's like im stuck in the 90's with all these reboots

Just now I clicked on something and it just locked up for like 5 seconds without and kind of indication it was working on something.

During an update it just crashed/closed for apparently no reason.. that or it knew when I hit the submit button on this blog ;)

It's always asking me if I agree with stuff before I can continue.. does anybody ever actually read that, it is very very very long? I guess there are so many lawyers that they need something to do?

x11 through ssh tunnel on windows

2010-02-05T07:23:00.000-08:00

Got xwindows to work on windows:

1. install cygwin , make sure you install the x11 package. This can take a while, you may (haven't tested) only need
xorg-server
xinit
xorg-docs
X-start-menu-icons
2. run c:\cygwin\bin\startxwin.exe (starts x11 server)
3. in putty, enable x11 forwarding for your session
4. connect ssh

client certificates

2009-02-26T04:30:00.000-08:00

We built a new web server and the script that was supposed to grab a client certificate wasn't parsing the certificate correctly. It was returning a bunch of "pz8" and some other garbage. I found one post of someone that had the exact same problem (with no answer) at:
"http://www.derkeiler.com/Newsgroups/microsoft.public.platformsdk.security/2004-06/0072.html"

This is the asp code that grabs the certificate:
http://support.microsoft.com/kb/216831

I couldn't figure out how to reply to that post so I thought I would post the solution here. Luckily, I found this not so easy to find KB that has the solution to the problem: "http://support.microsoft.com/kb/886810"
The solution is to add a key/dword to the registry:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\ASP\Parameters
DisableCertificateBlobAsArray=1

writing style

2009-02-12T07:55:00.000-08:00

I basically use free flowing style to write my blog, but when I write papers for school I do focus on style. I found a decent guide for writing style (http://www.crockford.com/wrrrld/style.html). Most of it I already knew but there were a few things I learned from the guide and all of it is useful.

MIT lectures

2009-02-11T11:51:00.000-08:00

Every wonder what lectures at MIT are like? OCW allows anyone to access many MIT lectures.

http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/web/home/home/index.htm

FCC

2009-02-11T10:24:00.001-08:00

I went to an Expo last Saturday and talked to the FCC. I asked them about net neutrality and they really had no idea what I was talking about. I'm not sure who is protecting the consumer from a virtual monopoly on household internet connectivity. Maybe someone should ask Al Gore.

Integrating Internet and Home Theater

2009-02-11T09:53:00.000-08:00

So I've been tooling around with my home theater design. Canceling cable and only having a netflix account and a huge antenna really felt limiting. All the media is going to the internet now and I wanted a way to watch or listen to the internet on my Home Theater. I found out this is a fun hobby!

It all started out when I had a party and wanted to pump music into our den when I found an Apple Airport for 50 bucks on craigslist. After setting it up I found out hmmm.. this is interesting, I'm using one Itunes to access all my media libraries and control what is being pumped out to the airport or any shared speakers for that matter. I found out I could use my Iphone as a remote for the whole thing. (BTW, this would work for an Itouch too) How cool! This all works via some magical thing called Bonjour.

Anyway, I had the same glorious music tracks permeating almost every room of my house. How ubiquitous... great for parties! Now we can do that choochoo train dance thing all through the house and never lose the beat! You really have to see it to understand.

So this lead me to look into hooking up my TV/Home stereo to the internet. Well at first I found a dlink media server on craigs list but the girl I wanted to buy it from flaked out on me. Then, I realized that I had an old desktop with XP on it that I didn't use laying around. So one DVI to HDMI converter later I connected the PC to my stereo and TV.

Great, I have HD now and a computer connected to it but I want to do more than Itunes don't I? So how do I control it. I didn't really want to use a wireless mouse/keyboard on the couch because the pointer was so small. Remote desktop wouldn't work because it kicks the console out to let you log in. The answer was VNC! I could console straight in from my macbook sitting on the couch (which I normally keep near the couch anyway).

So I'm really loving this setup. I'm streaming stuff from my netflix account and I also recommend hulu.com (Battlestar Galactica / Heroes!). My "media server" / PC didn't have a DVD player hence the older post about streaming DVD's using VLC. There are so many things I can do now. Not only can I control it from my laptop but my wife can use her own laptop to control it or I can use my Iphone! I wonder if there is a VLC client for the Iphone so that I'm not restricted to using the itunes remote.

Now if Cox would pay for ESPN360 like many other ISP's =( After canceling cable the only thing I really miss is ESPN. Other ISP's do have this available and I am considering switching.

The next phase of the project will probably be to add a tuner to my media server so that I can take the input from the huge yagi I have in the attic and record/pause/rewind it. Over the air TV is still one of the few sources of HD quality video I have coming in right now. HD video has such high bandwidth needs you don't see a lot of it. Hulu has 420p which is pretty good and a lot of sources for media call their content HD but it is not. It has to be at least 720p to truly be HD, ideally it would be 1024. I read somewhere compressed HD requires somewhere on the order of 5 mb/s.

I'm also looking at a way to stream in ESPN and possibly take things beyond my router to allow myself to watch and control things away from home. I don't think it would be hard to do.

Cognitive Bias

2009-02-10T07:01:00.000-08:00

We studied this in Dr. Hester's Methods for Rational Decision Making and Game Theory class at ODU (ENMA702). The Wikipedia article is a good starting point for many cognitive biases.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases

Why is this interesting? Because cognitive biases help to explain why folks make subjective value judgments! These biases affect many, if not all, decisions. So if you are a person that makes decisions or wants to understand why others see things the way they do then this is for you!

MOSS Dev Tools

2009-02-09T05:43:00.000-08:00

http://www.codeplex.com/wspbuilder

"No more manually creating the manifest.xml file.
No more manually specifying the DDF file.
No more using the makecab.exe application."

This isn't C++ but we do have to worry about memory management.. is this out yet?
http://blogs.msdn.com/sharepoint/archive/2008/11/12/announcing-spdisposecheck-tool-for-sharepoint-developers.aspx

VLC

2009-02-08T09:30:00.000-08:00

VLC is an awesome media player. First of all, you don't have to mess around with codecs. Secondly, VLC works on a lot of OS's. I used it today to set up a streaming server in order to stream a DVD across my network to another computer. It is even more powerful than I knew!

The following are the steps I used to first create the stream server and then consume it on another networked computer.

From the stream server computer -
1. Start VLC
2. -->Media-->Streaming
3. click the "Disc" tab
4. DVD (no dvd menus)
5. put in the drive letter for the dvd drive you will be streaming from
6. click "Stream"
7. select "Play locally" if you want to for testing purposes
8. Click RTP and Prefer UDP then put in the address or name of the computer you want to stream TO.
9. I used MPEG-TS encapsulation but didn't play with any other options yet.
10. Under the "Video codec" tab check "Video" and I found DIVX3 to work well. I also maxed the bitrate at 8192 kb/s.
11. Check Audio under the Audio codec tab and leave the default settings if you want.
12. Click "Stream"
13. -->Tools-->Add Interface-->Web Interface

From the computer will you want to consume the stream on:
1. -->Media-->Streaming
2. "Network Tab"
3. Select UDP in the pull down
4. Click "Stream"

I haven't had a chance to play with the quality levels to much for video and sound so you may want to look at that some more should you want to do surround sound or possibly higher quality video.

a good article about the economic crisis

2009-01-22T10:09:00.001-08:00

http://econ.bus.utk.edu/faculty/davidson/cepapolicypub2008.pdf

C# Convert Color (Name) to HEX (HTML)

2009-01-14T05:11:00.000-08:00

private string ConvertColorStringToHex(string colorString){
return Color.FromName(colorString).ToArgb().ToString("X8").Substring(2,6);
}

print out columns and rows of a MOSS list (C#)

2009-01-09T11:50:00.000-08:00

private void outputList(string listName, HtmlTextWriter writer, HttpContext hc)
{

SPWeb site = SPControl.GetContextWeb(hc);
SPList = eventsList = site.Lists[listName];
DataTable dt = eventsList.Items.GetDataTable();

writer.WriteLine("<table border=\"1px"><tr>");

foreach (DataColumn dcc in dt.Columns)
writer.Write("<th>" + dcc.ColumnName + "<br>");
writer.WriteLine("</tr>");

foreach (DataRow drc in dt.Rows)
{
writer.Write("<tr>");
foreach (object obj in drc.ItemArray)
write.Write("<td>"+obj.ToString() + "</td>");
writer.WriteLine("</tr>");
}

writer.WriteLine("</table>");
}

BTW there may be some typos because I had to escape all of the HTML by hand... unless there is a way to do this automatically google needs to fix this.

embed javascript in a moss web part

2009-01-08T10:34:00.001-08:00

Way too embed or include javascript in a SharePoint WebPart without having to worry about all the quotes and escape characters etc.

1. Add the javascript file to your project and change its properties to an embedded resource.

2. Add this to your OnPreRender method:
Page.ClientScript.RegisterClientScriptResource(this.GetType(), "Namespace.FolderPathToResource.Script.js");

3. Add this to your AssemblyInfo.cs file:
[assembly: WebResource("Namespace.FolderPathToResource.Script.js", "application/x-javascript")]

High Springs City Commission

2008-11-05T09:24:00.001-08:00

I am so very happy for my mother. She won a seat on the High Springs City Commission. Here is a link to the article:
http://www.highspringsherald.com/articles/2008/11/04/breaking_news/break01.txt

GRATS MOM!!!

Less Government

2008-10-18T11:16:00.001-07:00

I've always been impressed at the raw truth John Stossel has been able to reveal. Problem is, most people don't want to hear it. And it takes most people to change anything in a democracy. This reaffirms my alignment with Ron Paul. I know he isn't going to win, but I think I'll vote for him anyway.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/Vote2008/story?id=6048937&page=1

Obama Tax Widget

2008-10-17T07:38:00.000-07:00

Interesting, this widget estimates how Obama's proposed tax plan affects you. Who knows if he will actually be able to execute this plan or not.

http://taxcut.barackobama.com/

Overnight on Lafayette Creek

2008-10-17T04:03:00.000-07:00

Just as the sailing season is coming to a close we decided to invite some friends up for one last sailing trip. Jason flew up from Gainesville FL at a last minute notice, he shall forever not be called lame. Mick flew over from wherever he was that week (Ohio me thinks). Lynn and "Crazy Girl" Liz drove down from DC. We had a most excellent time even though there were over twenty knot winds. Because of the winds we decided to sail out of the James River away from the rollers coming in from the Chesapeake Bay and head into the Elizabeth River.

We made it to Norfolk Waterside for lunch and ate at the always aesthetic Hooters. I was content to join in on the children's festival at Town Point Park, however the relatively mature ambiance of Hooter's was calling us like the sirens. After eating, walking through the mall, and cleaning up, we decided to go back down to the marina and hang out on the boat for a bit. Some laid out, some had a dance party with themselves (yours truly), and others played spectator.

After failing to figure out what was wrong with the spinnaker and foresail halyards we decided to cast off. Tiffany was disappointed that we didn't stay all night to watch the Gator game but who could resist anchoring and saving the dollar fifty per foot rate? We had a little trouble backing out with this boat because she, the Pure Joy, doesn't like to steer to aft. It is curious to me that someone always appears out of nowhere at marinas when you are need a hand.

We put the sails up and sailed to the Lafayette Creek before sunset. We anchored in about six or seven feet of water across the channel from the Norfolk Yacht Club by the Hampton Blvd. bridge. We could see Lifestyles of The Rich and Famous hanging in the distance. Jeff was out of town or I'm sure he would have brought her out to say hello. After the magical sunset, everyone got tucked into bed and I passed out on the deck surprised that Jason took the midget bed below instead of fulfilling his reputation as an outdoor sleeper.

In the morning I was so proud that Tiffany figured out where the anchor rode went all by herself so that we were able to keep Pure Joy from running over the road and going aground. We made way back towards the James River while giving everyone another chance at the Helm. Liz was so funny, she said she was so "nervous," and was really scared she was going to mess something up. I talked her through a Tack as we turned upwind towards the Hampton Creek.

After a delicious and re hydrating lunch off the Hampton City Dock we made one last restroom stop and started towards the pump out station before finally making it back to the Norfolk Naval Sailing Center. A peculiar thing happened at the pump out station. As I was docking the boat and beginning to pump out Tiffany asked me if there was a bathroom at this marina. I told her I didn't think so, so she promptly proceeded to disappear with Lynn. While waiting the motor was running. I told Jason as soon as I turned the motor off the girls would appear. That is exactly what happened. The girls told me that someone had told them we needed to pay five dollars for pumping out and that they had to jump the fence to get back in. Lynn said they didn't know who we were and my instructor from the Norfolk Naval Sailing center never told me we had to pay when he trained us on pumping out. This made sense because it was a Navy boat and the pump out station was a DoD facility. To make a long story short, the "someone" who talked to the girls called Norfolk Naval Sailing Center and talked to my instructor about the fee and graciously added that someone on my boat jumped the fence: how embarrassing! I offered to go back and pay the five dollars but I guess the damage was already done so it was best to let it be.

All in all this was a great trip and everyone had a blast. I really appreciate everyone chipping in on the expenses. I would have this crew again any day of the week.

Chrome

2008-09-05T08:42:00.000-07:00

I decided to give Chrome a couple weeks or so to see how I liked it. The trial only lasted a day or two. Everything was working nicely until I tried to watch youtube videos. Whenever I moused over the video the thing would lock up for a little while. I abruptly switched back to the latest version of FireFox. I was impressed witht he strategies outlined in the comic so maybe I'll give Chrome another try later.

Life Styles of The Rich and Famous

2008-09-05T08:25:00.000-07:00

This time it was Allen, Justin, and Antoine on the river with a little surprise visit from the "Lifestyles of The Rich and Famous". This was a surprise to see Jeff fly out of nowhere in his tiny little motor boat. We almost fell overboard laughing at him as he did donuts around the our boat.

The wind really confounds most people their first few times on the sailboat and you can tell it is really not something they normally think about until they are on a sailboat. Making all the connections between the wind, the configuration of the boat, and the response of the boat is very complex. It made Justin just randomly jump into the water a couple times! I've come to expect folks really focusing in on how fast we are going and I try to use this situation to teach a little bit about sailing. Most of the time I just get blank stares or their eyes glaze over. It is interesting to see how other people learn and explore new activities. Learning to sail just takes some technical thinking and in my experience once you learn some of the fundamental vocabulary and concepts it really starts to catch on fast. It also helps if you can use the bathroom in the water or off the back of the boat :)

Next time if there is a little wind and we have more time I'm going to try to make it down to waterside (Norfolk).

overnighter at Sarah Creek

2008-08-26T07:20:00.000-07:00

My longest sailing trip by far. We considered heading back because it was so rough, but I was stubborn and determined to stay the course... We got out at about 1000 Friday morning and were eating blue crabs at the Yorktown Yacht Haven by 1600. Tiffany got sick and passed out before we even made it out of the James River. Same thing happened the next day except substitute James river with York river and the no sick part- I thinks she is getting the hang of it!

On the way out of the York River, Tiffany, aka Crab Trap, was at the helm and doing very well. I think she believes the crab trap buoys are like targets for where to sail? While running over every crab trap buoy in the river, she was able to teach herself how to find the groove between the no go zone and a close haul. What a great multi-tasker! I was very impressed and decided to use my break from the helm to troll with a giant lure I bought at Wal-Mart. Without skipping a beat, Crab Trap went straight for a crab trap and I immediately found my first sail boat catch was to be a big crab trap buoy rope.

Almost the entire trip I felt like we were really hauling butt with a max speed of over 9 nmi/hr I felt like the tiller handle was going to break off. Suffice it to say that it was very very windy. The GPS read almost 80 nmi and average of 7 nmi/hr. Kate at Norfolk Naval Sailing center said an old old sailing dude that had spent years out on the water said it was impossible for us to make it that fast. Obviously I gots sklz!

sailing Hampton Roads

2008-08-20T11:40:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I took Jeff Hastings and Justin Lynch sailing on the Endeavor, a 25 foot C&C day sailer. It was a beautiful day with lots of dolphins, boats, ships, and birds and a background of blue skies. Unfourtunately, I forgot my phone so I wasn't able to take any pictures to post here.

We went over to Hampton via the channel and stopped at the Blue Water Marina for a few drinks before heading back. Jeff was very anxious to get back and see his family so we decided to try our luck at going straight over the Hampton Shoal. Let me first say that there are two types of people that sail: those that have run aground, and those that will run aground. To our surprise we managed to run aground not once, but twice. I had always looked forward to running aground and was happy to skip across the soft bottom of the James river. The first time we were so stuck that I was unable to sail out and had to fire up the engine. The second time I was a little more prepared and once we started skipping along immediately jibbed to turn the boat around. We finally made it far enough west to get around the shoal and head back, barely making it back by the seven o'clock deadline.

For the next couple days I will be preparing for my first over night sailing adventure this weekend. Tiffany and I plan to go up to Yorktown and anchor in Sarah Creek Friday night. Hopefully I'll have some pictures of that to share.

my first blog entry

2008-08-20T09:04:00.001-07:00

My friend Travis Whitton (http://dailyvim.blogspot.com/) has inspired me to try and start making a new blog. I'm not sure what I'll end up writing here, if I write anything at all, so lets see how it goes. I hope to write about solutions I find at work, but also a bit about my leisure activities, such as sailing. Anyway, if anyone is reading this please enjoy and don't be shy =)