Saturday, January 09, 2010

War Machine Costume...Errr, We THINK It's a Costume [Iron Man]

Either one guy has spent hundreds of hours meticulously handcrafting his own War Machine armor, or some boom mic operator has busted off the Paramount set and he's terrorizing the club scene with style.

While the suit is still a work in progress, it's currently constructed out of high impact urethane covered in a brushed metal finish (plus, over 600 rivets have been implemented so far). And you'll be pleased to know, the thing shoots bottle rockets...if we're not misreading a joke.


I know what you're thinking: finally, we know how Iron Man got that beer gut. [SuperHeroHype via technabob]


Send an email to Mark Wilson, the author of this post, at znex@tvmzbqb.pbz

moc.odomzig@kram.

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Friday, January 08, 2010

I'm pretty sure this place is a brothel

via tweetie

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Happy Bug

Happy Bug

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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Oh Beer. Is There Any Problem You Can’t Solve?

Submitted by: I shot it. via Submit a Kludge!


Favorite Comment:
Fixer TexasDan says, “Evolution of the column: doric, ionic, moronic.”

Ms. Fix-It Cautionary Fail , , ,

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…. I See A Bad Train Conductor

.... I See A Bad Train Triver.

Submitted by: dunno source via Submission page

mesofunny Happy Accident , ,

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Nacho Ordinary Can Opener

Nacho Ordinary Can Opener

Submitted by: Deborah Lautaret via Submit a Kludge!

Favorite Comment Thread!: Oh my God, y’all are cracking me up this morning. Fantastic thread. Plus +5 internets for all parties involed!

Started By: Fixer Blackmoore, “Day 51. I’ve managed to kludge a can opener so that I can eat the remaining stock of canned food. I expect this will last another month, or until i run out of ammo for the shotgun and the zombies finally get me.”

Fixer Pat says, “Day 52: Ate two beans today on accident; can survive one fewer day now.”

Fixer dono1 says, “Day 53. No luck yet on opening my remaining can of mystery food but the past few days have given me a chance to study the picture on the label. It’s either potato chips with rasins or miniature Dr. Scholl’s air-pillow insoles topped with okra slices. I’m so hungry now I would gladly eat either. The zombies are getting bolder and were not scared away by the torch I made from a roll of paper towels. If only I had some duct tape to seal up these windows…”

Fixer anon says, “Day 54. After consuming some of the contents of this can, its effects appear to be acting as a zombie repellent. They don’t seem to have any interest in eating my brain today. I suspect it is because my brain would taste like what I have been eating. Also, in spite of it being the middle of summer with no AC and not having showered for a week, I am not sweating nor do I smell. I also feel remarkably comfortable and relaxed. I now believe I have been eating Dr. Scholl’s odor destroyers super comfort insoles rather than the air pillow insoles.”

Fixer bobdobbs says, “Day 55 I fear the insoles have stopped by bodily functions and I have been unable to quench my thirst. They are super absorbent and even if the Zombies do not get me I fear the insoles have taken their toll.”

Fixer Blackmoore says, “Day 56 – I have managed to locate a hot water tank full of potable water, and drank the entire contents. Still uncomfortable, but the zombies are still repelled. I’ve located another stock of sealed cans with no labels – but I am running out of shotgun shells.”

Fixer Blackmoore says, “Day 58 – PANIC! I’ve run out of Duct tape!”

Fixer dono1 says, “Day 59. I think I’m in luck. One of the cable channels was having a MacGyver marathon and I was able to catch several hours worth of episodes (although I had to keep the volume down so as not to alert the zombies of my presence). In one episode called Ugly Duckling, Mac made a shotgun shell out of an old paper towel tube, a flashlight battery, parts from a smoke alarm and some Tabasco sauce, all wrapped tightly in duct tape. I’ve got most of those ingredients here in my kitchen except the Tabasco but I do have Cajun Catsup Hot Sauce which should suffice. Unfortunately, I still don’t have any duct tape and… Wait! I hear a crashing sound out in the garage…”

Fixer Zombinator says, “HOLD TIGHT WE ARE GOING TO TRY TO SEND IN MORE DUCT TAPE….. WE DO NOT WANT TO GET TO CLOSE SO WILL BE THROWING THEM THROUGH THE WINDOWS….”

Fixer Ast says, “Day 60- I finally worked up the courage to approach the garage. The zombie repellent seems to be still working, but I can see them patrolling around my fence. To my astonishment, the pet chicks that I bought 2 months ago have matured, though I have no idea what they were eating all these time. I seem to be in luck! The crashing sound announced the arrival of my duct tape collection, which my now grown chickens have knocked down the shelf for me!”

Ms. Fix-It Mission Improbable , ,

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Defiance

Defiance

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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Halt Hammerzeit

Ich Bin Ein Breakdance

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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Japan

Japan

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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This Week’s Installment Of Stickmen In Peril

Oh no. It looks like spending several days in close quarters with his extended family has driven Sticky to drinking again. For a while, alcohol turns Stickman into a lover.
Stickmen In Peril
Eventually, between the beer and the salt water, Sticky has to go. But Alcohol makes toilets into a strange and devious creature. Let’s give him a moment to figure it out.
Stickman Learns To Use The Toilet
Unable to alleviate his bladder, Sticky becomes belligerent. Finding an outlet for his frustration and rage wherever he can. He’ll show that toilet who’s boss.
Caution: Javelin Throwing Area.  Heads Up Or Heads Off
Not to worry. This must happen a lot because the rest of the Stickman family has a plan. He’s strapped in nice and tight. Now to just mop up the puddle, wipe away Sticky’s tears and wait for sobriety.
Stickman goes insane
Post By: Lady Of Odd

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Stealth Kitty 1 to Home Base:


funny pictures of cats with captions

Stealth Kitty 1 to Home Base: It’s frickin cold. Over.

shudda worn ur sno bootz.

Picture by: Anca Caption by: SnowballMan via Our LOL Builder

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Mission Failed

Fail Training

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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Alright, Halliburton. Enough Is Enough.

Alright, Halliburton.  Enough Is Enough.

Submitted by: dunno source via Submission page

Favorite Comment: What’s everyone talking about? All I see is a picture of an empty road.
By: Rich

mesofunny Wow , , ,

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Workman’s Comp Ain’t What It Used To Be…

Submitted by: NecronomicoN via Submit a Kludge!


Favorite Comment:
Fixer Sticky says, “That’s the last time Tiny Tim will complain about equal rights.”

Ms. Fix-It Recycling is Good, Right? , ,

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No, Spot, you may not “has


funny pictures of cats with captions

No, Spot, you may not “has cheezburger.” Not until you are able to ask in a manner that is gramatically correct and lacking typos.

star trek iz a fan of teh petz. (via ROFLrazzi)

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: DOOMbudgies via Advanced Lol Builder

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Viva La Music Revolution

Viva La Music Revolution

Submitted by: J. Magee via Submit a Kludge!


Favorite Comment:
Fixer Violet says, “Oohh! So *that’s* what pirating cable is.”

Ms. Fix-It Dare to Dream , ,

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Transatlantic Travel Has Never Been So Easy

Transatlantic Travel Has Never Been So Easy

Submitted by: dunno source via Oddly Specific

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Basement Goggie says go ahead


funny pictures of dogs with captions

Basement Goggie says go ahead and scream, Lassie ain’t coming.

lassie haz gotn soo layzie

Picture by: AshleyS Caption by: Bernie22405 via Loldog Builder

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AHHH!

AHHH!

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

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CUTENESS


funny pictures of cats with captions

CUTENESS Lullin hoominz into a false sense of security every time.

mah innocent look wurks every tiem.

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: katschally via Poster Builder

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Attention Dogs:

Attention Dogs:

Submitted by: dunno source via Oddly Specific

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Divide By Zero

Divide By Zero

Submitted by: dunno source via deMotivational Builder

Awesome picture there.

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Frosty’s


funny pictures of cats with captions

Frosty’s Illegitimate children

watch awt 4 dose snowman killerz!

Picture by: Samuel R. Avro of Consumer Energy Report Caption by: Rotarydial via Our LOL Builder

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Spit it out NOW, lady!


funny pictures of dogs with captions

Spit it out NOW, lady!
That was OUR hotdog!

cuz we tax cuhllectin goggies

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: adiadv10 via Loldog Builder

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See that picture looks really really ... unsavory. Especially if you only see the bottom half and don't see the top caption.

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The feather…


funny pictures of cats with captions

The feather… …. is dead. You are most welcome. Now about my fee….

mah furst kill wuz free.

Picture by: Peter Hasselbom Caption by: Desami via Advanced Lol Builder

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I Has a Worry


funny pictures of dogs with captions

I Has a Worry
I no Like Creepy Christmas Doggie.

he is watchin yoo

Picture by: Marilyn Potts Caption by: Alexandryia via Loldog Builder

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Thursday, January 07, 2010

This Sounds Hazardous

This Sounds Hazardous

Submitted by: dunno source via Oddly Specific

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The Moon’s Only About The Size Of A Quarter

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vegas


funny pictures of cats with captions

vegas showgirl kitteh

shh… dont tell wut i didz in vegas.

Picture by: Emma Caption by: dunno source via Our LOL Builder

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Tuesday, December 29, 2009

Ukraine Begins Employing Giant Combat Robots for Security [Robots]

"TIS is proud to inform that we are the first in our Kominternovsky region to employ Giant Humanlike Combat Robots within the Security Department. Model TIS-1CB." That's the caption for this photo. What are they up to in Ukraine? Updated.

Seriously, if anyone has a detailed explanation for this thing, please shoot me an email. [Pravda]

Update: Thanks to all those who sent in the explanation for this strange metal fellow. Sergey G's details, in particular, were very helpful:

TIS (Transinvestservice) is logistics company near Odessa. They had problems people finding their warehouse (you know - knowing to turn left after 15 km and stuff like that), so TIS set up an giant robot made from old cars as a signpost.

As a side-note: "Giant Human Like Battle Robots" is a popular meme in Russia and Ukraine. "When [are we] going to employ Giant Humanlike Battle Robots to protect our borders?" was a winning question for Putin on his nationwide interview with Internet folk. Yuschenko (Ukrainian president) was asked this as well since then.


Send an email to Rosa Golijan, the author of this post, at etbyvwna@tvmzbqb.pbz

moc.odomzig@najilogr.

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Cats are natrualy talented


funny pictures of cats with captions

Cats are natrualy talented when it comes to evil plans.

iz in our blood.

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: mattbru77 via Advanced Lol Builder

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Prezident cat


funny pictures of cats with captions

Prezident cat iz safe

ill take a bullet 4 u anyday. (via IHAH)

picture: dunno source, via our lolcat builder. lol caption: n0s

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009

Model Rocket Fail

Its a model rocket X wing... Guess R2 couldn't lock down that stabilizer!

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Freddy used to hunt birds the same way as any other cat.


funny pictures of cats with captions

Freddy used to hunt birds the same way as any other cat. Until he found a military bolt-action rifle in the basement…

dont needz a gun. just needz a wet kitteh.

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: Coyotekitty via Advanced Lol Builder

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Monday, December 21, 2009

You Can Have Furries At Your Wedding, Too!

You can have Furries at Your wedding too!

Submitted by: www.furaffinity.net/user/da-fox via Submit Page

For the low-low price of $299.99, a Furry will drop by your wedding for extended photo opps, lifestyle tutorials and children’s entertainment. End-of-the-decade special!

It’s not just a fursuit … it’s a state of mind. 

 

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The lesser known reindeer,


funny pictures of cats with captions

The lesser known reindeer, Angry.

just call me furious.

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: 1pixie via Our LOL Builder

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Hare Force pilot


funny pictures of cats with captions

Hare Force pilot

u part of bunway airlinez?

Picture by: dunno source Caption by: mlundercuffler via Our LOL Builder

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There Is Also A Sign Here.

There Is Also A Sign Here.

Submitted by: I took this photo in Pittsford, NY via Oddly Specific

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Train Stop

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Untitled

I don't normaly do the lunch/food post thing but today feels worth it.

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Monday, December 14, 2009

Wow! I didn't r

via tweetie

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Monday, September 07, 2009

Untitled

5 major outages in one day.... What the hell is going on at my work.

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Untitled

#atwork got an office to myself at the moment. Door says "techninal infrastructure coordinator" haha

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Disaster planning

#atwork Disaster Planning fun. Currently at backup site ready to failover if needed.

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Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Idea Space


Sent to you via Google Reader

Idea Space

[By Philipp Lenssen | Origin: Idea Space | Comments]


[Advertisement] Want to advertise here? Your ad will show in the blog and feed.

Sent from my iPhone

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Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Alpha Version of DIY Google Lattitude

I'm not going to link to the content yet... But ive just finished developing the core of a DIY Google Latitude workalike.

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Friday, February 06, 2009

Improved tagging in Google Reader

Heavy Google Reader users may have noticed a few subtle changes lately...
Over the last week Ive noticed changes to the tagging behavior and they appear to have settled down, with the current changes having stayed in effect for nearly 48hrs so far. [Before this the changes were not fixed and had usually changed again in about 24hrs]

I cant confirm if this is widespread or just being bucket tested, but Google appear to have begun to use a more intelligent tagging function.

Where as the old version was a rigid match, and many of the people using the auto-completion in the tagging system have probably had that moment where we realized that we just created a brand new tag with 1 single letter different that now doubles the time it takes us to tag because we have to tap out a few more letters before we know for certain that's the only tag its going to use.

The new tagging function appears to be using a fuzzy matching system that guesses at which of your existing tags you want to label the article.
While this may slow down people creating new tags, it does seem to be a better match to my normal usage. I tag with existing tags more often than I want to make a new tag.

This is the look of the old behavior.

If you make a mistake, say I continue typing the word Interesting, but I type 'a' instead of the 'e' that comes next, the tagging system will assume this is a new tag, and when i hit enter to select the suggested tag, it will save the text as a new tag and then ill have an unwanted new tag 'Inta'

These unwanted tags get in the way when trying to continue reading & tagging articles. Now this may seem pedantic but when your reading over 250 articles/entries/posts a day, the annoyance can add up to a significant level.
Getting rid of them basically requires you to open up the settings, switch around the tabs in settings & delete the tag, before refreshing the whole of Google Reader, to make sure nothing is cached.

After the new changes however things a lot better. The improved fuzzy matching means that it will only show your existing tags, placing the one that fits best at the top of the list of suggestions.

The new matching looks like this.





As you can see from these 2 examples. The new matching will avoid creating new tags by accident.

Having deliberately typed something that doesn't match my tags, it suggests a near match from my existing tags rather than creating a new tag.


This is the kind of polishing that's been a bit missing from most of the software I've seen lately. Its good to see people paying attention to the finer details again.

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Monday, January 12, 2009

First Boot

The first of the 4 IBM e-Server x-Series x330 Servers i bought is now online & booted to the basic OS.

Im having a well deserved Scotch to celebrate the achievement. Ill detail the config after I unwind...
6 hrs of working blind before i could get the thing to use a serial console from post to prompt so I've earned a little relaxation now while it compiles stuff.

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Wednesday, January 07, 2009

New Hardware Arrived

My 4 IBM eServer xSeries x330 servers arived yesterday.
Unpacked them. Checked all the parts as good. Good condition all round.
Will be installing an OS on the first one soon...

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Monday, January 05, 2009

New Project, Currently running in Stealth mode

Currently working on some very interesting stuff.
Quite surprised how quickly its coming together...

The work is currently in silent running mode till its anything more than a test code...
An alpha/tech demo may be ready soon...
More details to come...

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Monday, November 10, 2008

Google Reader, Feedburner & Blogger... Wheres the integration?

Ive got a simple idea. I want a link blog. A simple, short, "this is what i think" comment on the articles I've been reading.
It may seem simple, but making it how I want has proved to be too much trouble for me to continue down the road I had hoped to go down.

I have a Blogger account,
I use google reader as my feed reader,
I want to post my comments on the blog articles to a blogger blog from google reader.
Simple enough?

Wrong it seems.

Blog this is useless in google reader, since it doesnt work when on google reader pages, it nabs the google reader URL not the blog article.
To use it id have to manualy open each and every article & blog them after they load, which becomes tedious when your trying to blog the comments youve made on 4 to 5 hundred feeds.

Google Reader has a great feature... shared items & notes. Its perfect.
Except for its pathetic lack of features.
In case anyone hasn't noticed yet.
There's a few major issues with Google Reader that have yet to be addressed by the developers.

1: Tags in folders. (don't even think they CAN do this, since they've built the entire thing by treating folders AS tags) infact the entire sidebar in general is a problem. Such as why i have to hide it to get articles to use the whole screen width... this quirk alone seems utterly daft.

2: Tab order when in the Note an article popup. Tabbing throws you out of the section back to the search box in the main part of Google Reader. When I'm working with the keyboard shortcuts... its very irritating to have to reach for the mouse to make a tiny click to get to the next field when tab should obviously be working.

3: Style... Has anyone looked at the options for the style of your Shared Items page... yes i have a fully customized Blogger layout, and to make my Shared Items match that theme... ill take the ninjas header picture & the blank white page to match my BLACK theme... well done Google this is about the worst I've seen from you.

4: You have a share the item link, a Share the item with Note link, but no Just Note the item link... i have to manually remove the check box flag to share the item every time... google... FIX THIS, its not like you have to rebuild from scratch.


Now these four things are my main problems with google reader.
In particular id like to talk about number 3.
Google has everything within their power to build something better.
Why cant they.
I can build some convoluted re-poster script to scrape my Google Reader shared items & post it to blogger if i want, but i don't want to. that defeats the purpose of using the Note & sharing features.

I toyed around with Google Mashup Editor, with Google App Engine (though this I'm not yet finished trying to use to fix my problems), and Yahoo pipes. At the crux of it all is the fact that i like how the blogger template handles things for my blog and to rebuild everything up around a new soloution just to integrate my linkblog/commenting in a way i like is far too much effort to go to for the sake of these links.

Google Please add something to fix this.
You have the time to implement pretty trend graphs and havent managed to produce any improvements over the to be honest... pathetic... level of customisation. You so proudly added tags available for notes and havent seemed to come up with anything realy useful since.

Please Google Reader Team... Talk to the Blogger guys, get some communication going, and let me use the Google Reader shared/noted items along side my blog with pride.

Cause right now... its hard to be proud of a page that looks like I put not time at all into making it look different (even if i cant make it look different)

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Wednesday, November 05, 2008

Site Redesign Coming

As fitting a big change like this.
Im updating the templates & going to be integrating all the new stuff in together.
So template updates & new look changes due soon!

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Monday, November 03, 2008

Extrospection

Its an interesting few things that have all mixed together today.
Crossing several sets of ideas & some of my background reading has led me to some thoughts on the nature of my thoughts, online communication, online expression & writing and how it can be presented and delivered online.

I initially began with a small mountain of thought... I'm a prolific thinker, i can chew through several hundred blog posts a day, muse out a sizeable idea or two each day and somehow spend 8 hours at work complete with the normal wishes it was better, and gripes that i feel like sharing about my job. When I work through all of it & begin to tag & muse over it all. Theres a lot of stuff below the big idea layer. Most of it doesnt rate a full thought out blog post like this one. But its still worth sharing or commenting on.

So how can a blogger share all of this less structured information?

Micro-blogging, lifecasting, tweets, blips, bloops... seems like every time I look there is a new word for a new way to send something to either your friends or the world at large.

I used to ride the front of the wave, I was jumping on gtalk the day it came out, with no one else in my contact list using it for weeks. However i reached an overload point.
I became burdened with the task of avoiding unwanted communication, the signal to noise ratio of being a member of no less than 5 IM networks + several IRC channels became too much. If the signal i sought was random chatter i found it, but if i wanted to just have a quick technical chat to someone, it would be drowned out rather rapidly by people messaging me to say Hi or see how i was doing. I Pulled the plug on it all quite some time ago, & I'm now offline more than on (at least for IM).

But recently as I've begun to sink myself more into expressing myself through my various outlets, I've felt the urge to reconnect to the world, but i dont want to go back to the way it was, blocking & un blocking the chatty freinds that wont stop talking.
And so I wont. Ive been a fan of the microblogging idea for a while now, i used to do it years before it was popular infact. my first few weeks of blogging were filled with the 15 minute interval status updates, my mood, my work, my life etc.
And its come full circle again, Ive developed a plan for my content & how to manage it. Taking some inspiration from some of the very first examples of these kinds of message streams.

The idea of a stream of conciousness style of blog is not new, one of the first good examples is Anarchaia by christian neukirchen. He details the origins back in 2005

Inspired by the various examples ive perused, I've settled on a method of structuring my writings. Separating the content out into at least 3 distinct flows to avoid creating a blog that is unreadably frequent in its updates.
1: the 'Blog' type portion, containing extended works & original material from myself such as projects & code as well as posts like this one.
2: the 'note & tag' feed, where ill be posting shorter & more concise commentary on sites, other peoples blog & forum posts, videos, pictures, and all the other stuff that gets trawled as i go through my day.
3: the 'realtime' feed, this is where things get interesting, rather than going out and joining twitter or some other site (which i may do later & integrate back those updates into this feed, but for now its standalone) i will be posting the status changes, block schedule notices, random gripes & venting, and all the usual fodder for such short quick posts.

Its not 100% set in stone & obviously there's grey area between these 3 feeds, but thats the plan for now and ill be working on how to get it all rolling as i get the gears turning over the next few days.

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Wednesday, October 29, 2008

Future Work

A brief rundown on the upcoming plans for my blog follows after the break

[1] More frequent updates.
[2] Commenting on internet news & such... (Im getting myself all setup with some nice tagging & stuff to make this very easy for myself)
[3] More Layout Hax... percentage based layout with minwidth properties to prevent ridiculous glitching.
[4] Something about my Model M keyboards.
[5] Some more code work

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Sunday, October 12, 2008

Templating

New template time.
It took a while longer than I thought to work it out but here is the new template.
Its not quite finished yet but I was happy enough to post this up now so as to give an idea where its heading.

The template has switched to a 3 column layout to create some more sidebar options & I may tweak the sidebar a bit more if I dont like how the various widgets & gadgets fit.
Also i may adjust the size so as to widen the page just a bit more since I'm not sure if I'm satisfied with the proportions of the post text section v. the rest of the elements.

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Saturday, October 04, 2008

CEO of Nothing... for now

How does one begin... well at the beginning I suppose. I read a very good book once (Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars for those playing at home) and the book has a beginning in it, not the beginning of the book, but an event in it. Man's first steps on Mars, the era of manned martian exploration begins as it should with famous words. The first words on Mars, "Well here we are..." I cannot think of a more appropriate beginning. Its not a famous line its an honest one. I often step back a little in my mind and look for something to say about it all, at those moments where you try and take stock in life I almost always find myself thinking "Well here we are...".

And so, at the beginning of my renewed efforts.

Well here we are...

Now getting to business, I've gotten back into my blog because with a new job & new efforts I've had a renewed urge to make my mark on the world. Which leads to the conclusion... how do you make yourself stand out, how do you get your voice noticed let alone stand out. I suppose that's the reason Search Engine Optimisation has become an industry so fast.

Cutting a bit of the waffling around out of the process. Ive been doing a lot of programing again lately. Seems like every time i start a job I spend quite a while having to rebuild my little cozy environment with the programs/tools i like.
Switching from pre XP era NT terminal emulation programs to Putty was the first big step. Building some quick simple HTA "programs" to help with a few of the little tedious task makes a big improvement. Id like to rebuild everything from scratch but well I'm pretty sure that even though the security doesn't stop me. program incompatibilities make it not worth the effort.

With all the programing I've begun to want to do more work in other areas.
Ive been looking into IronPython a bit and I've quickly realised while its quite handy at building windows applications using python skills & native GUI elements its currently in a bad state of flux. Once SharpDevelop 3 gets out and the IronPython v2 extension is available it will be a much more useful programing language for me again.

So I've switched back to focusing on my general python skills & have begun work once again on my Python tools.
A set of basic utilities built entirely in Python. Basic & fundamental tools, Ping, Traceroute, etc built with python.
Work has been slow but it does progress. Once i get them in a more suitable state i plan on releasing the source & creating a public repository.

Touching base on the Title for a moment I'll just point out its a reflection on the fact i hope to accomplish more from my life and this is hopefully the starting point.

I'm also tweaking my page template & hopefully ill have changed the look a little before my next post.
Ill leave things there since i really want to work on the new template but hate leaving a post with some significant content unposted. It feels half done if i don't submit the work unless it just fizzles & winds up not being worth posting.

Next update will accompany the new template.

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Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Of synergy & desk harmony

The issue of managing an increasing number of devices is a growing concern.
With the pressure of a certification exam approaching me. I reached for a way to bring back my desktop into the fold.

My first such experience was using Synergy (goggle for it) an open source app, to simultenously work on a freebsd workstation & my xp machine. Having heard about Stardock software's similar program some time ago, when faced anew with a desire to corrale multiple machines to one keyboard and mouse, I checked to see if their fabled claims of looking at a mac client were true. Alas they arent after quite likely a year.

With that i was forced to Synergy and will quite likely be very happy once i get it setup... But that is the trick... getting it setup...

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Friday, January 12, 2007

Of Updates & iPhones

Its time again to sink my thoughts to technical matters into an appropriate venue, and so i fire up the blog again.

Im in possession of a small wad of cash, which i intend to use to get my Cisco Certified Network Associate certification. I have been trying to get a job uneventfuly for some time, and it seems that my biggest stumbling point is the lack of prior experience or some other proof of competency. Thus i have reached out, grabbed hold of some cash, and im going for the goal. Crunch time and ill have to knuckle down and lock in all the stuff i studied this year at uni. Ill have a formal qualification should I be successful, and with a formal qualification, ill stand a much better chance of getting a job despite my lack of experience.

Now, i said iPhone... I love it... Its everything i want in a phone from the look of it. Now with that said, small nag, 8gb is not very big, support for a memory card would have been nice, for movies especialy so... But with that i have to say that if apple are intending to only release this phone under 2 year contracts AND such a high price... theyre likely to hurt its adoption rate. Theres a market for such a high tech phone, i know because i had one untill it broke and i want one again to replace it. But tying the phone to a 24 month contract is something that gives me pause... Id happily sign a 12 month contract for the iPhone but by going with a 24 month contract theyre going to cut out a lot of people that arent confident in being able to commit to such a long contract due to any number of things. This isnt a clear step ahead for the iPod, its an odd twist. Its good to finaly see this technology they patented emerge and prove its working. But now it should be capitalised on.

an 80gb (or 60gb) Widescreen touch interface iPod would be good...

The natural pinacle of this haptic interface patent they have (thats the multi touch input touch screen btw) is a tablet. 12-14 inch, wifi, bluetooth, usb & firewire. Stripping out all the usual components of a laptop and moving them to peripherals. No Keyboard, No optical drive, no crap. Just a tablet. All the different peripherals can be moved out into either a docking station or to usb & firewire, and leaving it as slim and lightweight as possible so its the most comfortable tablet possible.

A powerful idea... and one im sure apple can make fly... question is... will they. The OSX interface is nearly perfect for such a touch tablet. But only time will tell wether it happens or not.

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Sunday, January 07, 2007

Mac Musings

All this was typed from a full screen console known as GLTerminal, on the mac

the extra polish put into the design of the mac user experience pays off. with the overall experience of both owning and using a mac having far surpased any other machine ive had before.

From the sheer simplicity of the setup process that remembers who you told it you are so all other software can reuse your initial setup information, to the unified password management, the .mac account syncronisation recently added is also a nice bonus allowing any mac you sit down at to be... just that little bit more like your own.

While anyone can claim that the overall experience using something is better or worse. The proof is always in the facts. From my own experience the battery life is superb on this G4 14inch iBook, and i can only expect it to be even better on the latest Core(2) based laptops.

Along with mentioning the improved battery life. I have to mention something quite specific to the laptop experience. The "hibernation/sleep" functionality on this iBook is fantastic. Its smoother, faster, and though not something i can verify offhand, it has caused me the least amount of trouble of any device with similar features that ive ever used. I close the lid and seconds later its sleeping, I open the lid and a few seconds later its awake. Something im sure has only improved in performance in the newer models.

I preffer the unix command line, i like having the the power to drive everything through the keyboard, or remotely, and having a wonderful fairly standard set of commands to do what i want on almost any unix system. But being a gamer, and a long term windows user, ( windows NT isnt as bad as it used to be, or as good as it first was... but if you look after it, its not as tempremental as yould think) I find myself accustomed to using a GUI to manage multiple tasks, and using mulitple consoles. And i still occasionaly like to game, so having some kind of entertainment type programs is good, and there are a fair few.

I'm rambling now I think. So I'll leave it there, having said plenty for now about how nice i find this Mac.

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Thursday, January 04, 2007

I swear im not dead

Ive just been busy with my head in the sand

Ive had an extremely busy new years, done a pile of stuff.
Ive suddenly gained a large amount of social momentum which is also cutting back on the exessive thinking time that spawned this blog in the first place.

I will get back to updates more regularly once things settle down and i get my own internet back ... again

And while im at it http://www.ampledesign.co.uk/va/ owns in that funky electroplankton, music anyone can make kinda way.

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Sunday, December 10, 2006

New Hardware

Ive now taken possession (abeit of a temporary and 'non permanant' fashion) of a 14inch iBook G4

So ive been around Mac OS X and ive been getting used to all the things more and more and im fairly convinced should apple produce a tablet i will purchase it. I just love how nice everything is on the Mac... i dont want one as my main workstation but as a laptop... i cant fault it. Everything works!

Expose above all is a pleasure to work with. Just flick to the corner and all your windows are at your fingertips... another corner and all the windows from your current application appear... its a joy to watch things flow so well when i work now.

Im looking forward to getting a lot out of this laptop over the next couple of months. And ill probably be mentioning some of the things here.

First things done were, setup, aquiring a .mac account good for the next 12 months, installation of firefox and the TigerLaunch app (quite a good one), and VLC to make up for some of the inadequacy of Quicktime as a general movie player.

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Monday, December 04, 2006

Hardware Updates

To solder hax or not to solder hax, that is the question...

While working on my power cabling efforts ive grabed some solder and begun wrestling with the urge to Solder the IEC sockets from 2 power supplies to get my outside of case to insde of case 'passthrough'. Along the way toying with the idea of using the fan mounting on the back of the PSU for an extra fan for more drive bay ventilation.

Im not entirely confident of my soldering ability and dont know if i should procceed with the soldering of these wires intended to carry 240V AC. Theyre already soldered, so while its obviously not a bad thing... I dont wish to screw anything up and cause further damage to any components i cant afford to replace. Thus im deadlocked with myself on how to do this... likely ill wind up hacking around some more till something crops up thats a better soloution to my power supply passthrough... ideas are brewing but i cant check them while out at the moment.

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Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Hardware Work

Case Work Time!
Ive had a renewed desire to work on improving my machine since my acquisition of extra memory.

I'm planning on redoing my Power Supply layout (dual PSUs can be tricky to manage cables without modular cabling, which i don't have on these two) In addition to this im thinking of trying to obtain some rounded and longer cables for my UDMA5 cabling (ATA100/133 - IDE 80 Pin cables) to clean up the biggest source of cable clutter which is at the moment the large number of drives ive got installed. Powering them is second to this but with molex cables taking up only a fraction of the space of an IDE ribbon cable, and their lengths being far easier to manage, I'm beginning to get very frustrated by standard UDMA5 cables, so the search has begun for replacements.

With the extra memory in my system, I've put back the plans to purchase a 512MB module quite a significant way down the to do list, and shifting into 1st place on the hardware list is the purchase of a SATA hard drive of reasonable size. Quite likely a Samsung 250GB 7200RPM 8MB cache drive for about $90AUD. This is going to consolidate all 4!! drives I'm presently using and give me freedom to experiment a bit more with Gentoo since it will free up my 120GB PATA drive.

If I get a camera I'll take some photos of the before and after of my case through this work.

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Monday, November 27, 2006

Apple Tablets

With my growing desire to have a tablet PC, tablet related news has increasingly grabbed my attention and I'm hoping to at some point be able to obtain one. With news like this only increasing the likelyhood that a future laptop purchase will be a tablet. Apple are apparently experimenting with a tablet concept for home & educational users.

This kind of untapped market would probabyl latch onto an affordable well built and attractive tablet PC and do nothing but bolster the growing support Apple has had of late.

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Friday, November 24, 2006

Confirmed Suspicions

Blog This was the main source of my blog posts for some time when i started using Blogger and the issues ive had with it since starting use of the blogger beta are most annoying. Finding this confirms that theres an update needed an id realy encourage the developers to sort this out.

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Amazing Art

Well this is certainly something to be stunned by.

500 Hours of work in MS Paint

Very Impressive

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