i5m

This is from (almost) two years ago, but is just to say farewell...

Fri, 23 Jul 2010 12:36:48 +0100

This is from (almost) two years ago, but is just to say farewell to what has seemed like my own personal sunset generator. I shall miss this field and the views. Especially the convenience!

On to new fields and new views from tomorrow.

"Minimise Class icons in diagrams. If enabled, then the attributes and operations compartiments will..."

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 14:38:00 +0100

“Minimise Class icons in diagrams. If enabled, then the attributes and operations compartiments will not be shown in the classes on the generated class diagrams. Note: This item is checked by default, and is overseen by many users, which are then surprised by the result.”

- argouml-stats: 10.3. The File Menu

So something is enabled by default that surprises many users? That doesn’t strike me as good interface design. Anyway, thanks to a bit of googling and this forum post I figured it out.

I’ve only got a simple Java app and really didn’t want to have to install Netbeans or Eclipse just to generate a Class Diagram, so I’m glad I got ArgoUML out figured.

Currently Entertaining My Ears

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 13:04:51 +0100

I need to get my life so it’s single piece flow, but in the meantime I seem to be working in batches. And this batch is music.

School of Seven Bells - Disconnect from Desire. When something gets mentioned enough it’s worth checking out, but after first listen (It was at work and I was totally “in the zone”, so not paying full attention, trying to get some JavaScript in XSLT to work cross browser: Chrome, Firefix and IE6 - yes IE6. But Firefox gave me as much grief!) I can only say it’s ok-ish. Need to listen again. Was a bit like background music, but that could be because it was. It’s a bit - no, very - Stereolab-ish (especially on Babelonia). Which isn’t a bad thing, but I’ve not listened to Stereolab in years. Perhaps it’ll grow on me after a few more listens - if I notice it’s playing. And, also, “electronic dance-floor beats”? Where? I missed them.
Herbaliser - Herbal Tonic. Sensual Woman. Awesome. Been listening to this track for many years. Have no idea how I came across it, probably back in days of Napster, so a lovely surprise that this popped up whilst listening to this album. Made me smile. Made my day.
Chemical Brothers - Further. From Brothers Gonna Work It Out (whichever track those lyrics are actually from; that’s the first time I recall hearing the Chemical Brothers) up to Push the Button, loved it all. But that weird Salmon Dance thing really put me off. This is more of a return to form. Bit slow to get going, but skip about the first 6 minutes and it’s there - of course to be fully appreciated probably requires you to be stood in a field off your tits.
Mumford & Sons - Sign No More. Got the free track on iTunes ages ago, wasn’t that fussed. Also, bit disapponted to find out they aren’t really a “Mumford” and sons; not even related! But, have been watching Glastonbury and T in The Park on the box and The Cave is just so good to watch live - more so because the crowds just look so happy. So I love The Cave and the rest of the album is ok too. Reminds me a bit of Fleet Foxes, but much better.
Massive Attack - Heligoland - Meh, sounds just like 100th Window to me, so a bit dark and depressing.
Pendulum - Immersion - I feel a little bit wrong to be listening to these. Like I shouldn’t be allowed (Am I too old?). But I love the stuff they do with Freestylers and I remembered watching them last year (on the telly) at a festival and, much like watching Mumford & Sons, it just looked like a hell of a lot of fun. I like Waterclour, But otherwise. Not quite for me.
Audio bullies - Higher Than the Eiffel - Awesome. There’s your electronic dance floor beats. This is going to get some listens.

ResophNotes - Quick Notes on Windows

Thu, 22 Jul 2010 12:02:00 +0100

ResophNotes - Quick Notes on Windows:

I’ve wanted (I think*) something like this on Windows for awhile: a client that syncs with Simplenote. I actually like the look of Simple Software Notes better (after all, simpler is better), but I can’t use it at work because it doesn’t include proxy support whereas ResophNotes does.

* I say think because I’d had Resophnotes for awhile, but hadn’t used it because I wasn’t sure I wanted any personal information synchronised on my work machine - I try to keep personal info off it as much as possible. But then I found out there was a portable version of Resophnotes so I’ve given that a whirl. But I guess then I need to think about encrypting my USB drive. And also, 15MB seems overkill for something as ‘simple’ as simplenote. So I might just return to using the web interface as a desktop app via Chrome. Oh decisions!

On Camping vs Sinatra

Tue, 20 Jul 2010 13:27:16 +0100

On Camping vs Sinatra:

Magnus Holm’s email to the Hackety Hack mailing list. His email is written in Ruby so you can download and run it. Mind blown.

Back to Spreadsheets?

Wed, 07 Jul 2010 22:50:37 +0100

Wesabe are shutting down. Which is disappointing, more than annoying; I feel worse for the guys who ran it. Credit to them though, and confirming my belief that I made the right choice with them (even if they are closing):

They’ve always offered quick, painless data export - So I’ve not lost anything I’ve put in.
They are open-sourcing their code - If you are going out, do it with style!

At the time, I thought they didn’t have a business plan, but it turns out they did (And while it’s still around, the announcement from Wesabe themselves).

And on the face of it, it seems like a great idea: take a product built and tested on end users (lots of end users since it was offered for free) and sell to banks. Basically any financial institution could provide a Wesabe interface and functionality for their users with minimal implementation.

But then you’ve got to remember just how crap banks are. They don’t give a shit about their punters so they are hardly going to splash out the cash for something that benefits their customers more than them. Shame though as the banks could do with dragging into the 21st century: cough Smile the ‘Internet’ (?!) bank.

What next? I really don’t want to use spreadsheets again. And Mint is still 100% useless outside of the US. But I have found three new alternatives:

Pocketsmith (free and pay) - Looks interesting as they have a different (calendar) based approach and also focus more on forecasting - which is what I am most interested in. Whereas Wesabe was primarily analysing historical spending (although I managed to do limited forecasting with it using manual cash accounts).

Giving these a whirl at the moment. Bit tricky to get going; Lots of screens, functionality, etc. Much steeper learning curve and so I am still trying to figure out if I’m using it right; for instance I have a forecast calendar (that is currently wildly optimistic) and a transaction calendar that shows what my bank balance currently is. I would have thought I should be able to get them to match up, well at least be able to use the forecast events to see how I will be next week, etc. But I haven’t figured this out yet. Perhaps I manually adjust the forecast balance for a particular day?
Greensherpa (pay only, but with 30 day free trial) - I’m not adverse to paying and they have good privacy (but here, I’ll talk more about Pocketsmith).

I like how Pocketsmith do this: Have a fully functional free account, so gets you in and using it, but to make it really useful you have to pay to upgrade (so you can export data and add more than eight budget events, because eight isn’t really enough; although you can (and should) consolidate events - I.e. If all your utility bills come out on the 1st of every month then group the whole lot as one budget event and match all merchants to this one event. Utility bills tend to be fixed; it isn’t a ‘budget’ you really want to track).

Also, 30 days can go by quite quickly. I’ve had an account with Pocketsmith for 12 days now, but haven’t had the time to use it everyday and so still haven’t figured it out.

And lastly, Pocketsmith’s middle plan (the upgrade from Free) is cheaper than Greensherpa.
lovemoney (Free, supported through targeted advertising, etc - you have to fill out a profile to register) - Missed this one last time round. UK based with UK bank support. Can’t import data, but with automatic bank support I was tempted to try this.

The good: Worked flawlessly with Smile and (I think) pulled in the whole last 12 months of transactions (all that is available). Also made some attempt to automatically categorise payments. You can also set the month start date (which I’ve done, but is now confusingly reporting me as being in the red - not figured that one out yet).

The bad: No manual entry, not even a cash account so impossible to budget/forecast even on a most basic level like I did in Wesabe. But still, since it’s automatic, might just let this one run until they add more functionality and see if I can work out Pocketsmith in the meantime.

110 Format lives again

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 13:02:07 +0100

110 Format lives again:

- via choschiba in the Flickr 110 Format group.

Adox are hand making 110 film cartridges. Available for pre-order. Plus, it looks like they are in talks to take over 126 format production, if all goes well it would be available again in 2012.

Photo blogged with kind permission of iri5 (and on that note if...

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 19:49:00 +0100

Photo blogged with kind permission of iri5 (and on that note if you want to reblog, it really wouldn’t do any harm to ask her permission, she seems very nice).

It’s not exactly uncommon for me to see or come across things that are better than anything I could do, be it bits of code or bits of art or anything else. We are surrounded by people who are better than ourselves. That’s a good thing as long as you let it give you hope and let it inspire you, or at the very least just enjoy what other people can do.

But then there’s the things you come across that are not only good, but also fall into the category of something I’d never-in-a-million-years have thought of doing.

It’s difficult to pick an overall favourite from The Ghost in a Machine set, but I’m going to with this one (this work-in-progress one a close second), since I was a bit partial to Nine Inch Nails back in the day and the Broken EP was on tape, but recorded on one side only (well, that’s how I recall it, but Wikipedia says side two was 15mins of silence and then two hidden tracks - I can’t recall if we ever twigged that as kids; wonder if my old school friend still has the cassette?; it was in the days where we would take turns to buy albums and then lend them to each other to tape; ah! high speed dubbing - ripping CDs or downloading from iTunes is just not the same).

iri5 is an Georgia based artist who is amazingly talented. And I’ve detracted far too much with my inane ramblings.

10 Years in Tech: iPhone 4 vs iMac G3

Fri, 25 Jun 2010 17:07:57 +0100

10 Years in Tech: iPhone 4 vs iMac G3:

This is interesting. Especially to me, since I owned an iMac G3*; of slightly lower spec than the one in the article as well. I loved that sage iMac (and the iSub I had with it), it was the first time I realised you could smile just by sitting in front of a computer. I’d (obviously) never experienced that will the beige Windows boxes I’d used before; almost with a SGI machine I’d used at work. It’s not just the comparison of specs that is interesting: the iPhone costs half of what the iMac cost me; which is probably still the single most expensive item I’ve bought myself.

Ten years ago it was foreseeable that iMacs would be way better down the road, but that mobile phones, cameras and GPS units would be small add-ons to a handheld computer? It will be interesting to see what other gadgets are obsoleted in ten years time. The computer is king at the moment.

And interesting that I came across this article as I post this. Who’d have thought that Nokia would be like this? And basically because mobile phones (as a standalone item) are dead (not counting luddite-me with my Motorola F3).

* Unfortunately I don’t own an iPhone 4.

Polaroid > Digital

Tue, 22 Jun 2010 20:21:29 +0100

Polaroid > Digital:

It just is.

Mudhoney UK Tour

Thu, 10 Jun 2010 15:22:22 +0100

Mudhoney UK Tour:

Wow. I didn’t even realise they were still going. Brings back memories - not that I’ve seen them; never did get to see them live when I was really into them (school years), but I associate them with good times. Plus Pokin’ Around is on my (now defunct) Muxtape (basically my all time favourites mixtape).

Unfortunately I think my gig days are over, which is a shame as this is actually in reach.

Rex the Dog - Synthpop set recorded live at Musicalia May...

Mon, 31 May 2010 23:09:00 +0100

Rex the Dog - Synthpop set recorded live at Musicalia May 2010.

This is ace. Ghostbusters and Kids in America. Genius.

(Not a video, by the way)

Shoefiti I sat on this for awhile because I was hoping to make...

Wed, 26 May 2010 15:04:19 +0100

Shoefiti

I sat on this for awhile because I was hoping to make it better before I ‘released’ it, but I’ve come across two major roadblocks: 1) I’m not very good 2) I don’t have a lot of time. So I decided I might as well just make it public now.

It’s a simple Shoes browser for Librelist. When I started it, it was quite a clever idea as the Librelist Archive Browser was just a list of lists and a calendar. You had to select the list and then guess which days had messages by clicking on the calendar. I modelled this app on that interface, but with the benefit that the calendar indicated which days had messages.

Of course, since then, the Librelist browser has improved greatly (although there is a significant delay/bug in recent messages not appearing) by implementing a threaded style view of archives.

Should I ever a) get clever and/or b) get lots of time, I’d still like to improve this, just for me.

HacketyHack is a Ruby Summer of Code Project

Fri, 21 May 2010 08:42:41 +0100

HacketyHack is a Ruby Summer of Code Project:

Shoes is the “soul” of HacketyHack. This is fantastic news.

My Flickr all time search stats, since late 2007, click on the...

Fri, 21 May 2010 08:38:09 +0100

My Flickr all time search stats, since late 2007, click on the image to get more info.

Awhile ago Flickr changed from providing all-time stats to a rolling 28 days. They then made available for download, for a limited time, the historical all-time data. This ‘limited time’ comes to the an end at 01-Jun-2010, and to be honest I wasn’t going to bother downloading almost sixty Excel/CSV files dating back to 2007, because the likelihood was I’d never do anything with them. But then I heard about flickrstats by visp, simply authenticate the app and it gets you files for you, analyses them, and presents them in a lovely graph. Visp has also put together a demo video of it in action.

So if you are a Flickr Pro member, it’s well worth using this app before the 01-Jun.

Vim Colour Schemes

Wed, 12 May 2010 12:47:00 +0100

Owing to having to set-up Vim again on my work machine, I decided to have a look around to see if I could find a better colour scheme than pyte, which I’ve been using for awhile.

It seems there are a few good dark background ones (I didn’t find any other light background ones):

IR_Black - Very good.
wombat
zenburn

Of those I like IR_Black best, but I think I’ll likely toogle between pyte and IR_Black as overall I’m definitely more of a light background guy and don’t really get the whole “view on black” obsession.

I also went looking to see if the toolbar icons could be improved, because they are pretty terrible on Windows and was surprised to find someone had tackled this already, but I’ve decided to hide the toolbar as I don’t really ever use it. So that solves that problem.

And note to self:

set guioptions-=T  "remove toolbar
colorscheme ir_black "set default colour scheme

Shoes policeman builds for Linux

Wed, 12 May 2010 12:24:00 +0100

Shoes policeman builds for Linux:

ashbb is now knocking out recent Shoes builds for Linux as well as Windows. That just leaves us with OSX Snow Leopard to go…

Firefox 4: the HTML5 parser – inline SVG and MathML

Tue, 11 May 2010 21:59:00 +0100

Firefox 4: the HTML5 parser – inline SVG and MathML:

It’s good to see Gecko pulling some punches at Webkit (I love Webkit, but I don’t want it to become the only rendering engine. Webkit, at least Chrome developer build, doesn’t render the MathML properly from the inline MathML and SVG example, and the SVG not at all).

Some Ubuntu 10.04 Notes...

Tue, 11 May 2010 13:03:01 +0100

…due to my unexpected Ubuntu trial at work.

It’s bloody good. Looks lovely. I’d quite happily use this full time if I had that choice/option (not like there’s any competition with XP, but I mean I’d also switch from OSX for this; Was never a fan of the brown theme, preferring Mint, but I prefer this new theme to Mint).
Does multiple monitor support pretty much no problem. (The first time I set them up, laptop (1440x900) and monitor (1280x1024), I had a few glitches getting the settings to work: I had to apply the settings a few times and toggle between settings, etc until it worked ok. But subsequent times it worked first go. Bizarre.)
You can move the menus bars to the ‘main’ monitor.
To get Lastpass working, had to launch from terminal and be sure to export HTTPS_PROXY before hand
Non-persistant LiveUSBs aren’t that bad afterall: I used to use Slax a fair bit, because it’s small, looks good and I could have a persistant install on a 1GB usb stick (I don’t have the min 2gb for a persitant Ubuntu install :-( ). But then I twigged, there’s not that much downside to a LiveUSB install in cloud-computing land: I’ve just moved my Firefox profile onto another USB stick and I can reconnect to that each time I used the LiveUSB; tweaking other settings each time isn’t so bad.
Be VERY careful when installing to an external USB drive from the LiveUSB. The default settings will happily trounce the MBR of the internal drive. And although in theory this is fixable, in mine it wasn’t. Whole laptop had to be re-imaged. Ooops.

There ends another Roidweek. It’s been fun, as ever -...

Sat, 08 May 2010 00:21:21 +0100

There ends another Roidweek. It’s been fun, as ever - that’s my third one now. I got four (maybe five) shots I’m really happy with. Which isn’t too great considering there’s only ten in a pack, but I wanted to be a bit braver with the camera and try things like multiple exposures, wide angle lens (plus tape to hold it on) and manually exposing using the f/58 aperture - none of those attempts came out great, but it was still fun trying.