icepop

Lost in Translation

2009-03-28T17:03:00.000Z

I love this. The poster and the film.

Observation

2009-01-16T18:39:00.001Z

If your article is set in a text size that i find too small, I'm more likely to Instapaper it than bother increasing the text size in my browser.

Just something I noticed.

This is how i roll

2009-01-13T03:02:00.005Z

Since i have an assignment to do, i thought i'd talk about my setup and software - it seems to be fashionable at the moment (see: My Setup by Damian).

Hardware

I primarily use a 2007 15" MacBook Pro (2.33 GHz, 3 GB RAM). It's a fantastic machine and i would be hesitant to replace it.

At school and when i'm out and about, i use a MacBook Air (1.6 GHz, 2 GB RAM). I generally use this for note taking or browsing the intertubes. It's not a powerful machine by any means. Amazingly portable though, you don't notice it in your bag.

I also have a wireless keyboard and a Mighty Mouse (both by Apple) but they don't really come out unless i'm working on an essay or a night of coding.

Software

Now the fun stuff.

These days i find myself doing a lot more with graphics, i never used to. For messing with photos i love using Pixelmator and for other graphics stuff i use Acorn, described as the image editor for humans.

For coding i use Coda, 'nuff said. I also use Nano for light coding and note taking, inexplicably, i find it a joy to use.

My browser choice is an equal mix of Firefox, OmniWeb and Safari. I usually have them all running at the same time.

Other apps i use include:

Quicksilver — for finding/launching stuff
Backup — for backups
Balsamiq Mockups — for mockups
AppDelete — for uninstalling applications

Fun with port forwarding

2009-01-06T04:50:00.004Z

So i've been having a jolly time getting a server (a Dell computer) to talk to DynDNS and the problem lay with the forwarding of ports.

The network at my parents house consists of a generic ISP router plugged into an Airport Express to make it wireless (yey!). I also use a bunch of these wonderous white boxes to extend the wireless signal around the house.

So the error i made was trying to forward ports from the router directly to the Dell computer. This didn't work. I finally realised that:

The router assigns the Airport Express an IP address
In turn, that particular AE is responsible for assigning each computer on the WAN an IP address which is different from the IP that the AE is assigned by the router (confusing!).

So to get this to work you need to forward the ports twice:

Forward the ports from the router to the AE (using the IP addresses assigned by the router).
Forward the ports from the AE to the Dell computer (using the IP addresses assigned by the AE).

It works. Thankfully.

Good music

2009-01-04T02:32:00.001Z

Dark Water by Wade Waters

This is one of my favourite LPs of all time. That it's not on iTunes is pretty shocking. You can buy it from their record label.

sometimes i feel like a great chef

2008-12-26T20:15:00.001Z

sometimes i feel like a great chef
who has devoted his entire life
to monastic study of the art of cooking
& gathered the finest ingredients
& built the most advanced kitchen
& prepared the most exquisite meal
so perfect, so delicious, so extraordinary
more astounding than any meal ever created
yet each day i stand in my window
& watch ninety-seven percent of the world
walk past my restaurant
into the mcdonald's
across the street

— Poem from oPtion$: The Secret of Steve Jobs by Fake Steve Jobs

iPhone apps

2008-12-20T08:56:00.001Z

Beejive · £7.49 | iTunes | Company
Best application for instant messaging.
Byline · £2.99 | iTunes | Company
Feed reader that keeps sync with your Google Reader - so good it made me switch to Reader full time.
NatsuLion for iPhone · Free | iTunes | Company
I found Twitterrific to be slow where NatsuLion is a breeze (smooth scrolling FTW!)

Special mention

NetShare · was banned from the App Store which is a shame. I use it regularly, it's super handy.
i Love Katamari · £4.99 | iTunes | Company
I love this game, though can get a bit slow once the ball gets big.
Remote · Free | iTunes | Company
Wifi remote for your iTunes :D

Free(dom) software

2008-11-03T20:36:00.002Z

Teaching children to use Windows is like teaching them to smoke tobacco—in a world where only one company sells tobacco.

— Quote from Not Free at Any Price by Richard M. Stallman

Video games

2008-10-26T13:09:00.000Z

Some games i would like to have the time and money to play, in no particular order:

Castle Crashers

2008-08-28T03:21:00.003Z

Tonight i downloaded a fantastic game on XBOX Live Arcade called Castle Crashers.

It's basically in the same vein as other slash-and-hack games (I love Streets of Rage) but it's super quirky, brilliantly animated and quite taxing.

I'm betting the multiplayer is immense. Can't wait to try that out.

Handy links

iPhone 3G

2008-07-11T20:02:00.006Z

Well i got my iPhone 3G and was it worth the wait? Probably not.

Problems

In my mind, the original iPhone is of a better build quality - the plastic back and metal switches on the 3G feel a bit (dare i say it) cheap.
The screen doesn't seem as bright.
The phone is less rounded and slightly wider than it's predecessor so it doesn't sit as nicely in your hand :/

I'm hoping in the long run the faster data, GPS and further upgrades will change my opinion on the device but at the moment i'm feeling rather underwhelmed.

Should you get an iPhone 3G? If you have an original i wouldn't bother unless 3G/GPS is kind of a big deal for you.

EDIT: It's not all doom and gloom. I've been playing with MobileMe and i've found it pretty immense so far.

EDIT 2: iPhone 3G switches falling off

This is good

2008-07-07T03:27:00.005Z

You may or may not be aware that i'm rather fond of trainers.

Last May, Mr. Billion put this idea in my head. He thought i should start a trainer blog! It went a little something like this:

bon says: u should start a trainer blog
bon says: and on it
bon says: you could blog about trainers
bon says: on your trainer blog
bon says: about trainers
bon says: if you get me
rey says: all i'd do
rey says: is link Main Source
bon says: ha!
rey says: they could send me samples
bon says: i might open a ketchup shop next to Main Source and call it Main Sauce
And so on..

So i did. Start a trainer blog that is - though ill be posting other stuff too: this is good.

PS. I havent (yet) tested it in IE but it looks fine in Firefox, OmniWeb + Safari ;)

Fantastic Company

2008-07-01T12:46:00.004Z

I do most of my shopping online, usually ordering goodies from abroad (welcome to the future).

I hate it when you're trying to buy something and after going through a shopping process only to discover that they dont ship internationally (im looking at you Zappos).

How to solve this? Let's use Zappos as an example, based in the good ol' US of A.

Somebody would set up some sort of mail-forwarding company, who i shall call Fantastic Company.

I would go to this Fantastic Company's website, sign up and plug in my home address
I would order something from Zappos and have it shipped to the address of Fantastic Company, who in this case, have a depot in the USA
Fantastic Company would then forward it to my home address :D

Okay there are some obvious issues:

The order would take longer than usual to be delivered
Pricing (subscription?, charge-per-order?, etc)
Websites that only ship to billing address for extra security

So yeah. If somebody could set this up i'll be your first customer. Thanks!

Cat volume

2008-06-30T13:22:00.000Z

Should you need to compute the volume of your cat, this handy article will help.

Cats tend to leave a few appendages hanging out of the corners-- you may need to assist with folding the cat into the box for the final stages of approximation.

Quick post

2008-05-30T17:28:00.003Z

Id like to take this opportunity to point to a bunch of posts Sarat and Mark are doing on starting a company. First two are:

In other news im currently traveling back from @media and the wifi is free (like it should be!)

@media 2008

2008-05-28T17:00:00.003Z

Over the next few days ill be at @media 2008, a web design and development conference in London :)

BarCampNorthEast

2008-05-26T01:19:00.007Z

This weekend saw the first BarCampNorthEast!

Ive been to SemanticCamp before but this was my first BarCamp experience and im happy to report it was pretty brilliant.

Talks were given, games were played and a jolly time was had by all :)

Also? Bon hooked up his laptop to a projector for some fun big screen helicopter game action!

A large thanks has to go out to Alistair and Gareth who did a pretty sterling job of organising the event. Hopefully this was the first BarCamp of many to be held in the North East.

Twitter: barcampne, barcampnortheast
Flickr: barcampne, barcampnortheast

Nano

2008-05-23T20:43:00.002Z

In Nano:

To move to the beginning of a line: CTRL + A
To move to the end of a line: CTRL + E

That is all :)

Vista

2008-04-22T19:43:00.006Z

So tonight ive had the unfortunate displeasure of setting up my mother's new Sony Vaio laptop, running Windoze Vista.

The thing that strikes me about Vista is the hap handed approach to user experience, for example every action seems to require confirmation, and reconfirmation:

Vista: do you really want to run this piece of software?
Me: yes
Vista: really?
Me: yes!
Vista: but you downloaded it from an internet site!!
Me: I KNOW. RUN IT.

Needless to say, removing all the crapware and installing necessary stuff is taking ages. Did i mention the countless restarts?

Criticism of Windows Vista

App

2008-04-20T22:26:00.006Z

Somebody needs to write an app for Windoze. When you run it, it takes stock of installed programs and then cycles through and removes all that have not been flagged as essential.

This app would be a wonderous thing and could remove most crapware, including Norton and Roxio products which seem to refuse to uninstall.

PS. Im glad to say that slowly but surely my friends/family are switching.

Development environment

2008-04-02T15:54:00.002Z

Although ive only been at HHL a little while (second day, yo!) i find myself being much more productive and generally happier working in a development environment of my choosing (ie. whichever operating system/tools i prefer).

I know the above is a pretty obvious statement but i thought id post it anyway :P

New job

2008-04-01T11:46:00.007Z

Today is my first day at a lovely startup called Hedgehog Lab.

It's a massive change from working at a large agency (hello TH_NK! :)) but im very excited for the challenges ahead.

Some handy linkage

Fixx is our upcoming web app for making bug tracking a jolly experience
Building a developer-friendly company
The Hedgehog Blog (check out the comments too)

Irish Blog Awards 2008

2008-03-03T03:10:00.005Z

This weekend i had the pleasure of attending this year's Irish Blog Awards in Dublin. In case you haven't gathered, i'm not Irish. So how did i end up there? Well it just so happens that Bon's coding magic was powering the 2008 IBA so i came along as his guest (thx @bon!).

Prior to attending, i didn't know much about the Irish blog scene but by the end anybody could see that Ireland has a vibrant and passionate community of bloggers. I met a bunch of cool people, discovered blogs id never heard of and had an altogether jolly good time.

Thanks go to Damien Mulley for putting on a fantastic event. Hurrah for Irish bloggers :)

FriendFeed

2008-02-26T18:16:00.005Z

FriendFeed has launched! Ive been using it for a while and its pretty cool. Basically you can use it to aggregate and share all your online properties. More here.

Art on the underground

2008-02-21T23:01:00.008Z

Over the weekend, i found myself at Gloucester Road Underground station where i saw a pretty random scene (above). After a bit of digging on the 'tubes i discovered that it was an exhibition called Life is a Laugh by Brian Griffiths.

I think arty installations placed in public places are a brilliant idea. I recall seeing a photo on Flickr showing a previous exhibition, City Glow, Mountain Whisper by Chiho Aoshima, again, at Gloucester Road. Good work.