T11M

Over the past month I have been trying to find a good use for social networking web apps like Twitter, Identi.ca, Facebook, et al. They have to have a purpose; there must be a good use for them. I think I have finally found a decent use for them, although ironically it requires one last social networking plugin – Lifestream. Lifestream basically aggregates all of the social networking updates that I make throughout the day and displays them in one plays in chronological order. In other words, if you visit my lifestream you can basically see everything I have found important enough to do that day in the social networking realm. I have posted my Lifestream here on my blog. My goal is thus to create one (yes, just one) simple place where anyone can go and find all of the content I have posted, shared, or otherwise interacted with during the day.  At the same time I am still participating in the social networking communities.  Another thumbs up to the open source community.

Web Lifestream, WordPress

So a friend at work showed me Tab Mix Plus today. It’s a Firefox Addon that allows awesome customization of the tab features in Firefox. You can change the way tabs open, enable click functionality (middle click, double click, etc), and change the way the tab bar functions. Pretty freakin’ sweet. Man I love the functionality of Firefox!

Linux, OS X, Windows Firefox

My favorite superhero has always been Superman. He is the only superhero that has amazing abilities and then has to act human. All other superheroes start out normal and become something more. Superman is different. Anyway, I’ve been watching the TV show Smallville and have really been enjoying it. The acting isn’t amazing but the story is a great adaptation of the young years of Clark Kent. I’m a little late jumping on the bandwagon since the first season debuted in 2002, but that just means I don’t have to wait for new episodes. Hey OH!

Personal TV

I didn’t know just how cool home media centers could be until I created my own.  I currently have a modded Xbox running XBMC networked with an Ubuntu Linux server that I use for all of my media storage. Basically, the Xbox acts as a console and player for all of my media – movies, pictures, and music.  Startup time is quick, the resolution is amazing, and I can still play my favorite Xbox games.

The total cost of his project was around $100 and about 20 hours of time (that was my first time – now I can mod the Xbox and configure it within 2 hours). Most of  my time was spent pouring over forums, tutorials, and blogs trying to figure out exactly how to get everything to work right.  The invaluable HowTo that I used which provided me most of the information I needed was from the awesome writers at Lifehacker.  The rest of the set up and configuration I learned on the fly and through Aaron Brauer-Reike.

Want to do it yourself?  Jump over to my Wiki to see all my personal documentation (still in progress) or leave me a comment!

DIY XBMC

I am. Every time I try to use their service it is always really slow and parts of it are not working. My solution: go over to Identi.ca and sign up with their service. It’s not as well known, but it’s an open source platform that spreads the user load over a number of servers.  If you have a dedicated web server you can install your own instance of Identi.ca which you can then either limit access to or eventually will be able to link into the overall identi.ca network.  Identi.ca is still early in development so it will only get better as more people use it and the developers improve it.  Oh, and did I mention it supports OpenID?  Well it does.

FLOSS, Personal FLOSS, iconi.ca

I’m a big open-source software fan. Not gonna lie, I might be addicted to testing, configuring, and using it. My most recent find (well I knew about it, I just hadn’t tried it yet) is Songbird. It’s a media player similar to Windows Media Player or iTunes, but that’s as far as the similarities go.

The Songbird developers basically integrated together a media player and a web browser. Since the application is built on Firefox’s Gecko rendering engine the interface and extensibility is very similar to that of Firefox. Extensions expand the application beyond anything that iTunes could dream of doing by allowing users to customize the media player’s interface in just about any way possible. Some cool extensions that I installed immediately are Last.fm, LiveTweeter (Twitter support), Lyric Master (downloads lyrics), Mac Remote Control Support, Media Keyboard Support, SHOUTcast Radio, Song Notifier (displays song and artist info every time the song changes), and then a couple of different skins to customize the interface. Oh, did I mention its not bloated and slow like iTunes!

Another outstanding feature of Songbird is it’s ability to import your current iTunes library. Songbird will import all compatible files, but not only that, it will also keep up with changes you make in iTunes. This is critical for me since I have an iPhone and want all of my media available in iTunes. Now I can use iTunes when I must and the rest of the time I will use Songbird. Man I love open-source!!!

FLOSS FLOSS, Songbird

Hacking your Firmware on any device is always risky but that’s part of what makes it fun. On one hand if you mess up you are left with a “brick” (a damaged/not working device that is about as good to you as a brick) but if you succeed you gain some amazing capabilities.

So for those of you who enjoy a bit of a challenge and the benefits of enterprise grade routing software check out DD-WRT. It’s an open-source firmware platform that extends the functionality of consumer grade routers. I had flashed my router to it about 4 months ago and after struggling with it gave up and went back to the original Linksys firmware. The only problem is I’ve noticed a very large difference in the quality of wireless the router puts out. Today I set out to fix the problem and flashed back to DD-WRT. After about 20 minutes of installation and configuration I was back up and running with my WPA/AES encrypted wireless network. The speed difference is incredible. I would say at least a 100% boost in bandwidth. Why I went back to the original Linksys firmware I’ll never know.  If you have installation questions or want to know more hit me up in the comments.

FLOSS FLOSS, Networking

I finally gave in and installed Greasemonkey for Firefox. I didn’t like the thought of using Javascript written by someone else to modify web pages, but after playing with it for a few minutes the functionality is definitely apparent. My favorite script so far is “Google Reader Preview Enhanced” which enables the ability to view the web page the story comes from within Reader. So now I don’t have to open a tab every time I want to finish a story I just click the link and it opens a preview. The best part about Greasemonkey is how transparent and easy to disable it is. If you don’t want to have any of your Greasemonkey scripts run on a page simply click on the monkey head in the bottom corner of your screen. Rock on developers for Mozilla, rock on!

Web Firefox, Greasemonkey

So I finally was able to download the Windows 7 Beta. What a pain! They require ActiveX controls to be installed, which pretty much rules out downloading with an OS X only machine. So anyway, I finally got it downloaded using a PC at work.  Now on to the install…

9:30 am – I’m using VMware Fusion to load it as a virtual machine.  I chose all default settings, install from ISO image, and using Windows Vista settings (VMware doesn’t currently support Windows 7, but that’s expected).  Started the install.

9:50 am – Holy crap!  I’ve never installed any version of Windows that fast, let alone a beta.  I’m astounded.  Oh, and VMware tools is installing automatically.  I’m very impressed.  It’s as if Microsoft wants this product to be good!

9:55 am – VMware tools installed perfectly and readjusted my video settings.

10:00 am – Verified that VMware tools are actually working.

10:02 am – Entered Unity mode.  It’s really smooth and fast.  That’s a testament to both VMware and Windows 7.

10:05 am – Just for kicks I bound it to the domain at work.  I’ve never tested that before.

10:08 am – Waiting for my roaming profile to load.  It’s taking quite a bit of time, but that is the common experience so far in all Windows OS configurations.

10:11 am – Roaming profile loaded properly.  None of the logon scripts we have configured worked.  It said it couldn’t find the network resources… have to investigate that.

10:12 am – All of the network resources appear to be available.  I wonder if it is a problem with roaming profiles and VMware Fusion…?

10:16 am – Uh oh… Tried to restart to finish installing updates and got a Windows alert asking if I wanted to Force Quit applications or Cancel and close them myself.  Clicked Cancel and now just the background visible.

10:17 am – Ctrl-Alt-Delete allowed me to restart just fine.  Configuring Windows update and rebooting.

10:30 am – Installing Microsoft Office 2007.  At this point I am an hour in and have a very functional OS, not to mention it is inside of a Virtual Machine.  It seems like all of the software I have that worked in Vista is going to work just fine in Windows 7.  Nice.  Props to you Microsoft.  Props to you.

Windows beta, Windows 7

So yesterday I was listening to the Security Now! podcast and good old Steve Gibson was talking about ultra capacitors.  It seems that EEStor just patented a method of making ultra capacitors.  Their goal: to create a better, safer, longer lasting way of storing energy.  Their solution: ultra capacitors.

Check out their patent (PDF download) if you want the in-depth assessment of what they are going to do.  In short they have devised a way to increase the energy density of a capacitor and can now store the same amount of energy that a lithium-ion battery pack can store in 1/3 the amount of space.  Also because of the way capacitors work, all of the downsides of lithium-ion battery packs are non existent.  According to EEStor they have cycled one of their ultra capacitors 1 million times and it suffered no loss of storage capability!  Oh, and did I mention that you can charge a capacitor as fast as you can put energy in it.  So if you are charging a capacitor that would power your phone, it would take roughly 5 seconds.  Can you imagine?  A “battery” that you plug in and 5 seconds later put back in your phone so you can go another 24 hours!?!?  This is going to change our lives.

The ESStor Ultra Capacitor

If you want an in-depth explanation of the ultra capacitor check out the Security Now! podcast (mp3 download) or read the show notes.

Personal Inventions, Renewable Energy