Case in point: My personal web design and development firm, Spark Genius. Now I am currently busy with finishing a Masters degree and many other things in life, so I don’t do web development full time. However, I still like to have a good flow of business coming in. I usually rely on word of mouth, which has provided a good workload in the past. Occasionally though there are droughts, and I enjoy working on new projects from completely different sectors, and word of mouth was keeping me in just a few similar industries. I’m not big on SEO and did not want to spend big dollars or lots of time marketing the company, but I did want to increase exposure so that I could try and get more varied clients.

I found by way of a blog post on the personal site of a local web developer and SEO man I follow that he was starting a new project focused on niche directories. At first I thought it was Yahoo Directories from 1998 come back from the dead, but luckily it wasn’t. I signed up (see out my free listing here, yay shameless self-promotion! ), and eventually shelled out a few bucks for a “featured” listing. The results? Impressive…

While I haven’t been flooded with calls (thank heavens!) I have already received several very good leads, and have recently started a very compelling project from those. The leads have all come directly from the listing (the premium one on the front page of the directory probably), and I think it has worked well because people are typing “utah web design” and see a result listing local companies, and would rather have a curated list to examine than look at each company’s site in turn.

So lesson learned? Yes, my organic search ranking has increased slightly. Yes, I now have one more inbound link to my site. But are these what has generated results for me? No! It’s been the targeted list that people like to have at hand that has brought me new leads. If you can get yourself onto a similar directory, I think you’ll like it.

Download: rho-iphone-improvements.zip

From the readme:

I took my newest project and analyzed the design, breaking the project into reasonable releases and then sprints. Using the very excellent Scrum organization tool Scrumy, I wrote up all my user stories from my product backlog, and broke them all out into different sprints. I felt super prepared, and ready to watch my burndown charts trend down into completion!

The overall experience was mixed. Of positive note, I really liked the idea of splitting tasks into user stories and sprints, and knowing exactly what I was working on at any time. It helped me concentrate on one set of features at a time, and helped me not to get sidetracked. Scrumy was also an excellent tool for helping me to remember what else needed to be done, and what was coming up.

However, the one thing I realized was that being a project owner, developer, scrum master, and everything else just does not work. The full potential of the Scrum methodology cannot be accomplished with just one person (go figure!). Because I am the sole person at my agency, I found myself really just using my product backlog as a checklist. Because I wasn’t working in a team, there wasn’t a whole lot of added value that would normally come from applying Scrum.

Now all of this is not to say that Scrum "didn’t work," just that you need a team of 5-7 as the Scrum guide suggests to truly make Scrum effective. I will certainly be applying Scrum in team settings in the future, and will probably keep a lot of those elements in my own personal methodologies as I’m working alone. So go ahead everyone, use Scrum!

The version currently stands at 2.6.9, but it is effectively 2.7. This is because every time you submit a theme to the repository and it gets rejected for weird little reasons (as this one did), you are forced to bump up the version number it seems. Pretty soon here I’ll re-upload it as 2.7.

Thanks for everyone that did testing and waited for this! I’ll include a more detailed post later. For now, note that many CSS bugs have been worked out, it is now internationalized, and the Photoshop files are included in the download. Thanks for your support and enjoy the theme!

The twist came when I brought out my restore disks. I thought, “Hmm, I could put XP back on, spend the next day and a half doing system updates and re-installing software, or I could have an adventure.” I chose the latter.

I had a copy of Windows 7 RC1, so I tried that first. However, the computer that I was working with isn’t exactly new, and so it couldn’t find drivers for the video or sound cards, but most killer, no network drivers either. So that option was out in about 3 hours.

Then I decided to get even more adventurous! How about Linux? I downloaded Ubuntu 9.04 (because I had 8.04 but wanted the latest and greatest) and popped it on. So far, that has worked out much better, with instant access to sound and network.

It only took 18 hours to get the computer back to a working state, and so I think that I will make it into a mini-experiment. How could one week be without a Windows machine? I usually have a WinXP Pro desktop and a Mac OS 10.5 laptop. I will keep the laptop, but try to spend the next week without a Windows machine, which I usually use as my base development machine. I’ll give updates as the week progresses. Wish me luck in this strange new world!

Very good reason? O yes! I will be shutting down this blog on or around February 12^th. I will be leaving the 22^nd to serve a two-year mission for my church, and needed to shed some of the things that I will not have a chance to administrate to. Hence, my sites had to go!

However, they will be replaced by a static page with just a few details and notes for ya’all. I’ll finish out Travelogue 2.0, and then upload it to somewhere accesible. It’s already GPL’ed, so if someone would like to take charge of it, I WOULD LOVE IT!!! Just let me know in the comments.

Yes, it will be a sad absence, but it will be well worth it (to me!). Who knows, I just may write some occassional things and post an occassional photo somewhere about these parts, but don’t count on it. Party on ya’all!

You can see all of them by either clicking on the image on Google’s homepage, or by seeing Google’s history of it. Now maybe it is just me, but it looks like the cat and mouse are building something. And is that not an earth-looking thing behind the door?

Any conjectures on this? Happy Holidays!

Our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

Eyes are the window to the soul.

Yet there is so much more that can be explored here. Eyes, for the most part, portray emotions better than any other part of the body. Mouths can obviously portray emotions very well, but at the same time can often lie. Hands can speak of emotions, but require a physical action to be used. However, eyes require no action, and never lie. If the emotions are equated to the soul, then perhaps it really is true that they are the window thereof.

An example of kind of what I am looking to do is similar to this photo:

Technical Challenges

Eyes are a wee bit on the, um, smallish side, and I really want to focus on the eyes, and not on the rest of the face. Therefore, my shots will need to be very close, because I want to crop the picture to a panoramic of the eyes, but maintain as much size and detail as possible.

I believe the biggest challenge will be lighting. In many photos that are taken (sans perhaps glamour shots) the eyes are often transformed into darkish spots. I want to ensure that each person’s eye color is correctly portrayed, and that we aren’t looking at something shadowed.

As I’ve already said, I want to focus on just the eyes. This means that I will either crop the photos to a pano, or need to use something creatively to block out the rest of the face. My framing may get a little creative!

I’ve never done potraiture in any depth before, so I’m trying to learn all about lighting – evenness, brightness, natural tones, etc. For example, I’ve learned that to get the glints in eyes (when I want them) I’m going to need something called a “catch light” that is just a bright light that is reflected directly in the person’s eyes. I am also not sure yet what kind of lights I can use, I just know that typical incandescent lights are giving me a nasty yellow-orange glow. This part may require a little bit of investment.

Overall, I’m really excited about the many different directions I could take this. I already have some subjects in mind that I want to ask to volunteer. Some have simply amazing eyes that don’t even need to do anything to evoke (or portray) emotion, and others I think will be perfect for showing emotions. I am excited about the different mediums and effects I could use as well: intense color, black and white, duotone, blasted out, etc. I don’t want to have to do too much Photoshop work, but I also believe that in photography, you are working to achieve and formulate the shot that you want, and tools that help you achieve said goal are just that – tools. Not cheating techniques. Now if you completely change it, or use PS to enhance your basically crappy images hoping to get a great one, that doesn’t work. But otherwise, it’s good.

Unfortunately, I have only a limited amount of time to pull this off as well. I really would like to get it done by the time finals roll around, so that I could set up a mini-gallery to reward all those who have helped me. So that means I’ve got to learn how to do it, shoot everyone, print, matte, post, and provide a small text for every photo. But I am very excited about it, so hopefully with a bit of diligence and a lot of luck, I’ll pull it off.

Keep ya’all updated, and if any of you have any suggestions or tips, especially relating to portraiture and lighting, I would LOVE to hear them! Thanks!

Like I said, never taken a class, but has done some great work already. Keep it up Paige!

Everybody should watch it! And now I must totally retire, because we are going to have to leave at like 6AM. Have an incredible weekend everyone!

Her list contains everything from the mini (or major) personal accomplishments like doing a pull-up (#29), to the extravagant, such as writing a whitepaper (#2) to planning a surprise weekend trip for Ryan (#75). She has given herself 1001 days, basically 2 and 3/4 years, to accomplish everything, and even if it may not be a public blog (woops sorry!) then I think it’s a noble/cool idea.

At the risk of sounding like a copycat, I’ve started formulating a list of 101 things I’d like to do, and perhaps someday when it is completed, I’ll post it. Thanks Jennifer!

The District of Columbia police auctioned off about 100 unclaimed bicycles Friday. “One dollar,” said an 11-year-old boy as the bidding opened on the first bike. The bidding, however, went much higher. “One dollar,” the boy repeated hopefully each time another bike came up.

The auctioneer, who had been auctioning stolen or lost bikes for 43 years, noticed that the boy’s hopes seemed to soar higher whenever a racer-type bicycle was put up.

Then there was just one racer left. The bidding went to eight dollars. “Sold to that boy over there for nine dollars!” said the auctioneer. He took eight dollars from his own pocket and asked the boy for his dollar. The youngster turned it over in pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters—took his bike, and started to leave. But he went only a few feet. Carefully parking his new possession, he went back, gratefully threw his arms around the auctioneer’s neck, and cried.

From the First Presidency Message for the month of September, by Thomas S. Monson.

Not much more to say besides that. How often do we walk around, missing gratitude in our lives on even the simplest scale?

My first check in IE7 Beta 1, after viewing my own sites of course, was to see just how well it did with the Acid2 Test from WaSP. Well, check it out for yourself. Doesn’t look like the clouds have broken just yet.

For your daily dose of giggles and reality: 40 Things That Only Happen In Movies

Rather comprehensive, though I was suprised not to find anything on stormy weather or lightning!

Such is the case with “Saints and Soldiers.”

We gave the DVD to my dad as one of his Father’s Day presents, and watched it as a family. Well… as a family for perhaps 15 minutes, afterwhich we sent out all those under the age of 10. The film does not waste one second becoming an intense experience, as the first scene is the infamous massacre at Malmedy. In general, the story consists of four soldiers, trying to get highly-sensitive information to the Allies from behind enemy lines during the Battle of the Bulge. Every soldier comes from different walks of life, but their interactions and outward actions create a transparently strong bond between them all.

“Saints and Soldiers” tells stories of bravery and honor, as well as morality and self-sacrifice. The end that you hope for never comes, and that only adds to the deeply rooted meaning of the movie. The most focused character of the film, Deacon, played by Corbin Allred, is a member of the LDS Church, though it is only subtley announced when he says that he served a mission in Berlin. Deacon’s altruistic innocence saves his fellow soldiers and others caught up in the war, and provides a richness to the film not found in big-budget Hollywood flicks. To truly understand “Saints and Soldiers” however, it is critical that you closely listen to Deacon’s dialogue about life after death. Without it, you may never arrive at an understanding and satisfaction with “Saints and Soldiers.” Is that good enough to pique your curiosity but not spoil the film?

“Saints and Soldiers” was produced for under $1 million, but you would never be able to tell when watching it. The entire movie also seems to have been rendered with a high-pass filter, (though I could be wrong, I’m not expert in the movie industry) which provides a great amount of realism to the time piece. As an indie-film, the producers were trying to figure out a way to get the most people to see it, and therefore implemented a “shotgun” style move by sending it to as many film festivals as they could, hoping to get into a few. And into a few they were received – plus just about every other one imaginable! The movie was the winner of numerous awards, such as:

• Best Picture: San Diego Film Festival
• Best Picture: Sacramento Festival of Cinema
• Best Picture: Long Beach International Film Festival
• Best Picture: Marco Island Film Festival
• Best Picture: Ojai Film Festival
• Best Picture: Heartland Film Festival
• Best Picture: Stony Brook Festival
• Independent Spirit Award Nominee: Best First Feature and Cinematography
• Best Picture: Teluride Indiefest
• Best Picture: Gloria Film Festival
• Best Picture: Winslow Film Festival
• Best Picture: Temecula Valley Film Festival
• Best Picture: Big Bear International Film Festival

Wow, if that many people thought that the film was good enough to win “Best Picture” in just about everything, I’d say that I’d have to agree! Therefore, Go see it! I’ve seen it available at both Blockbuster and Hollywood Video here in Colorado, so I’m sure it’s available somewhere where you are! Now! Go watch it now! You won’t regret it.

It’s extremely interesting to watch, and fun to play as well, because it helps you along! (Read the About page for more tips). It has been featured at such venues such as Ars Electronica, for a “Language of Networks” demonstration. Check it out!

Yes, I am sick and tired of designing/thinking about/viewing pages specifically designed to fit in a screen where less than 800 little pixels go marching across the screen. I cannot stand much more of this horizontally-centered, margin: 0 auto; make a nice pretty drop-shadowed border stuff any longer.

After looking at tons of other people’s screens over the past year or so, and after reviewing a couple of valid statistics, I have decided that the next look for this site is not going to conform to fitting in less that 800×600 pixels. In fact, it may very well not even use percentages! It may be designed for 1024×768, or larger, and if you have to scroll horizontally, then you are not my target audience.

Gasp, I hear them now, the demons and overseeing lords of the web design domain! The shrieks of accessibility freaks who are foaming at the mouths! The altruistic, selfless people who are crying “but my grandmother with bad eyes won’t be able to see it!” Well guess what? If I have even once had a grandmother come to my site, I would be surprised. And even if she did, things are still pretty hard to see at 800×600, so using a bigger resolution isn’t going to dissuade her. It’s ridiculous that I must either forfeit nearly a quarter of my available screen real estate (at least 21.9% to be exact) because some people may not be able to use it. Well buck up and get along with it people!

If ya ain’t tall enough to get on the ride, you don’t ride.

1. Referrall logs can reveal some interesting sources, such as a referrall from Anarchy.org.au, “Your starting point for the anarchist movement in Australia.” Um, should I really be driving traffic to this site?
2. Amazingly, I’m result 16 for “EFY” in Google, which is kind of crazy. EFY is a massively popular weeklong youth summer program in my church, and to find myself at number 16 for my post EFY Rocks! is kind of funny.
3. In the top 100 results for search phrases used to get to my site are these interesting results:
   • 4: Picture of Cuba
   • 11: Christmasy names
   • 24:illegal fireworks
   • 35: 143
   • 36: 2382
   • 48: womenswallstreet
   • 59: huggues hoppe married
4. My browser marketshare goes like this:
   • IE: 26.28%
   • Firefox: 14.95%
   • Mozilla Compatible Agent: 10.56%
   • Opera: 7.42%
   • The Rest: Mostly RSS readers and bots

I think that’s most of the interesting stuff. Evidently I need to target traffic a little better! Happily though, my most numerous hits for getting to my site involve WordPress and Travelogue, and Travelogue downloads are just up up up! Thanks for visiting everyone!

This is most noticeable on the sample images from MSN Virtual Earth, where the resolution and quality is amazing. You will often see cars parked out along streets, vehicles at stop lights, etc. But what I cannot see anywhere is an actual person! No one walking on the sidewalks, nobody in convertibles, nobody in the swimming pools of the sample image here.

I zoomed in quite close to the large version of this image, and the only place you could possibly say there are people is on the lawn chairs in the bottom left-hand section of the image. But still, does that mean that every single person at that precise moment was either laying on a lawn chair, indoors, or invisible? I think not! Not a single person was walking on the sidewalk, getting into a lawn chair, or swimming? Imagine that, you look around and every single person in this large area is laying down, no one is up moving! Crazy!

Now, perhaps I’m missing something (and if I am, please let me know) but I doubt that the producer of these images, Pictometry is going to take the time to go into each photo and clone out every obvious human, but I can also see why they theoretically would. Two words that are wreaking havoc in our modern day sue-happy world: Personal Privacy.

But anyways, can someone spot some people for me so that I don’t feel so paranoid?

Travelogue is aimed at those that are using their blog as a, um, travelogue, but also works quite well for anyone else as well. It’s unique design is created for any-sized monitor, not just a column centered in the middle of the page. It paints the date differently than most themes (graphically, not just a line of text) and includes the PSD’s to change any graphical elements. Also supports a random header image through the use of php randomness and CSS classes. For more info, visit the Official Travelogue Page, and see who is using Travelogue around the blogosphere.

Safety was designed to fit some stringent standards, such as no graphics, only web-safe colors, and scale well to any size of display. Therefore, it isn’t going to shock your eyes when you see it. However, it is perfect for any sites looking to adhere to strick standards like this, so go at it! It achieves its rounded-corner effect through cross-browser compatible JavaScript. Also, the colors can all be very easily changed out to fit your needs. Dedicated page coming soon.

The Answer: I don’t know.

Let’s review the basics.

• Windows 3.1, released Spring of 1992.
• Windows 95, released in 1995.
• Windows XP, released Fall of 2001.
• Windows XP SP2, released Fall of 2004.

Differences between Windows 3.1 and Win 95 were huge – a new GUI, great advances in processor usage, the jump from a 16- to 32-bit operating system, etc. Quite arguably one of the best releases Microsoft has ever made. Windows 98 improved upon Win 95, and generally made things better. WinXP was a rather large change from Win98 (though built mostly on Win2000 technologies), presenting a new*er* GUI, and much more rock-solid stability than 98 had; essentially no more BSOD’s. Wonderful! Difference between XP and XPSP2? Well, besides three years of development time… two words: “security patches.”

Microsoft has kept pretty much in stride with a three-year development cycle. 92-95, 95-98, and 98-01. However, we are now facing the break in that cycle. Longhorn, initially slated to be released this year, has fallen to 2006, then 2007, and is now back at Christmas 2006. At best predictions, that is a 5-6 year break between the release of WinXP and Longhorn. Some may say “But look, SP2 was three years after XP, and Longhorn will be only 2-3 years after that!” Fellow power users, do you really accept that SP2 was a major revision? Aside from patching holes and finally turning on basic security measures, did SP2 provide any really great gains for the end-user or developer? Personally, I answer no.

Well fine, let’s give Microsoft a break and go with their Christmas 2006 release date, giving them a 5 year cycle. Besides, hasn’t Billy G. promised us the world on a silver platter with Longhorn? Isn’t all of this development time going to be worth it? Avalon will stun us all, WinFS will read your mind and give you your file, and Indigo will send every email you could ever think of. Great! These “three core pillars” are going to revolutionize the way you work, as stated by Paul Thurrott. But wait, what’s this? One pillar is coming out before Longhorn, one is dead, and only one is left to stay the course? Where is Longhorn?

O well, I’m going back to watching my classic movies from the 30′s and 40′s, I love them so much! Mr. Blandings Builds his Dream House, 6 classic horror movies, they’re great! Bye!

First on the list? A monster for sale! From the item description:

The brave, lucky winner of this auction will own one monster known to dwell beneath my daughter’s bed, in her toy box, and in her closet. Said monster was apprehended by me at 3:15 a.m. on January 31, 2005. I was able to capture him in a small insulated zippered cooler as it was the handiest object able to contain such a beast. When captured, the monster was in his invisible state.

Currently, 33 minutes before this auction ends, there have been 44 bids bringing the total selling price to $1,340.28! Thirteen-hundred dollars! If you wish to own your own private monster, hurry on over and bid on this steal of a deal!

Some people!

After further inspection and inquiring my teacher (Mr. McGill, one of the coolest guys ever, fourth time I’ve taken his class ) I found out that I had a Yashicamat 124, a medium-format camera produced in Japan in the 60′s. It shoots 120 and 240 film, includes a light meter powered by a battery that is no longer produced, and is fully manual. Exciting!

Mr. McGill was kind enough to let me take it home, and as soon as I can get to Wolf or Mikes, I will be picking myself up a roll of 120 to shoot away. Stay posted for the results.

You just know that every applicant in the world is going to start off with “I was born in…” So I asked a few of my trusted friends some different ideas for beginning a biography. Here, in no particular order of quality or seriousness, is what we came up with.

• “Once upon a time…”
• “Hi my name is _____ and I am dumb.” (Great for the scholarship apps!)
• “I came out of my mom in…”
• “My first moments of independent life…”
• “I began my journey to success on…” (You go-getter you!)
• “My mom gave birth to the 8^th Wonder of the World on…”

But if none of those suit you for some reason or another, here are some rather intelligent ones:

• “My life has been like a…”
• “My parents named me….”
• “My favorite color has always been… because…”

Have fun with your next autobiography! You only get one.

Bloggies: Asian

http://noodlepie.typepad.com/

http://popagandhi.com/

http://glutter.typepad.com/

http://tokyotimes.org/

http://blog.codefront.net/

European

http://elastico.net/

http://viewropa.com/

http://www.binarybonsai.com/

http://www.petiteanglaise.com/

American:

http://photomatt.net/

http://kottke.org/

http://atrios.blogspot.com/

http://chicagoist.com/

http://justwatchthesky.com/

Photography:

http://sh1ft.org/shutterbug

http://overshadowed.com/

http://sensitivelight.com/

http://adampolselli.com/

http://snowsuit.net/

Food:

http://tastingmenu.com/

http://theredkitchen.net/

http://chezpim.typepad.com/

http://becksposhnosh.blogspot.com/

http://101cookbooks.com/

http://thefoodsection.com/

Politics:

http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog

http://powerlineblog.com/

http://andrewsullivan.com/

http://watchblog.com/

http://washingtonmonthly.com/

Computers or Technology:

http://daringfireball.net/

http://engadget.com/

http://we-make-money-not-art.com/

http://slashdot.org/

http://osnews.com/

Humorous:

http://jonnybillericay.blogspot.com/

http://littleyellowdifferent.com/

http://gawker.com/

http://defectiveyeti.com/

http://fuggingitup.blogspot.com/

Best Designed:

http://hicksdesign.co.uk/journal

http://justwatchthesky.com/

http://brookelyn.org/

http://shauninman.com/

http://mezzoblue.com/

Lifetime:

http://megnut.com/

http://plasticbag.org/

http://a.wholelottanothing.org/

http://www.molly.com/

http://pamie.com/

Some categories were rather odd, specifically the Asian, European, and American categories. Because of what they were nominated for, I tried to choose blogs that contained content specific to those interested in that geographical region.

Photography was a blast to sort through – it was the category that by far took the most amount of my time! However, I think that two blogs should have been added to the list, Jinky Art and Utata – Catherine Jamieson Photography (which appears to change it’s interface pretty much every other day. Those are both by far my favorite photoblogs, giving me something to learn from and live up to.

All in all, it was a fun and explorative (made up that word) experience, and I have discovered plent of new and interesting sites that I would have not otherwise!

What about other possibilities? In this month’s National Geographic Adventure magazine (February 2005), there is an article entitiled “How to Sail Across the Atlantic (or the World) in 25 Easy Steps”. Right off the bat, you knew this was written by a rich couple, but hey, I read it anyway. It describes the said couple’s experience of purchasing a boat, and then sailing wherever they felt like for three and a half years. I was hooked by the time I read the subtitle.

Take this passage from the end of the article:

“We met sailors, such as Lin and Larry Pardey, who’d set out for a nice sail one day and were still at it over 36 years and 180,000 miles later. We met others who’d had very definite plans to circumnavigate in three years and hadn’t managed to extricate themselves from the north-west Caribbean yet. Many, like ourselves, found their course altered on a daily basis. A cold front from the north approaches, and suddenly you’re off to Cuba rather than Honduras.

In the autumn of 2001, we found ourselves crossing the Mediterranean. After a brief stop in Menorca in the Balearics, we pressed on to Sicily and the stinking cesspool of Palermo harbor, and from there, to little Cefalu on the north coast of the island. We stayed for a week trying to figure out the next step; whether to stay put and winter in Sicily, or make a late-season run to Greece, say, or mabe Israel.”

Wow. Doesn’t that just sound like one of the most incredible adventures you could go on? Not being bound by bosses, bills, or boredom, free to seek out your own adventure. Experiencing the countless different cultures of every port of call, struggling through repairing a broken part, observing the fishes of the sea that you may otherwise only see on the Discovery Channel. Imagine the stories and tales you would generate – all true – from such an enterprise.

Or what about doing something like hopping into your car and setting out onto a road, ignoring boundaries, state and country lines, and taking those byroads that seem like they’ll never go anywhere. For example, “The Motorcyle Diaries” (which I have never seen, bummer, durn R-rating) in which two friends set out on a motorcycle to experience whatever the road ahead has to offer them. Or the ad next to the sailing article, with a pciture of a group of hikers in an amazing mountain setting, with text that reads “What’s on your life’s ‘To Do’ List?” with checkboxes like “Explore Patagonia,” “Climb Mt. Kilimanjaro,” and “Sail the Galapagos.” Contrast this to my previous life goals such as “Go to college” and most risque, “Go sky diving.” There is so much of the world to experience out there, so many cultures to discover and learn about, so many different locales and lifestyles, how can you ever find them all by staying put?

Now of course, if I did manage to set out on my own adventure, I’d have just a couple of requirements. I would have to be able to take photographs all along the way, and I’d have to be able to blog about it and have some sort of communication (email) if I wanted it. I doubt I would go out for years on end, but more likely a month or so, because I can’t miss too much church! But oh what an experience!

Just you wait, you’ll be hearing about it soon enough!

“Your son or daughter has been absent from one or more classes to day. Here is some more information about the incident:
‘The student in question is a 12^th grade caucasian male, missing from class period 0.’”

Now does that sound like a police report or what? “Caucasian male?” “Incident?” Well, I didn’t know that a teacher’s error could be taken so seriously!

The categories I have been given (each panelist receives 10 of the thirty) are:
Asian, European, American, Photography, Food, Politics, Computers or Technology, Humorous, Best Designed, and Lifetime. Deadline for final votes is this Saturday, the ²²

Indian Ocean Tsunami Imagery – Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia

scenta

fatties …

I’m sure I’ll add more as they become available, or I become bored again. But hey, at least they go here instead of on the side! For those interested, the best resource to get started is Taylor McKnight’s site.

The Apple Product Cycle
Dang Macs (caution: Expletives)
And while we’re at it, we might as well insert a PC link too:
Windows Noises by Clown Staples
Slightly long, but has an excellent base track!

Location:
Map of Lockers First and foremost is the all important location of the locker. Observe the map at right. The map shows the entire Senior Hall, with the main doors at the top, and all areas in red being lockers. My locker is located right in the center of all the lockers, right on the curve which is the â€?major hangoutâ€? Locker #4113 is the last locker in the row, and is located next to the absolutely critical power outlet. Why is a power outlet so critical you ask? Well read on…

Equipment:
The main attraction of the locker is the stuff inside it. Not just your average every day highschool junk, but real important stuff, stuff that will actually make a difference throughout the year. Why? Because it’s cool stuff with entertainment value! And what is more important these days than entertainment value?? (Satirical voice there) So here’s the rundown, noting diagram at right:

Locker Diagram–image here

1. The TV: Perhaps the centerpoint of the locker is a small television, approximately 9� in size, and black and white, perhaps color. It will be purchased off of Amazon.com or eBay, depending on where I get the better deal. I want to be able to show movies like �Finding Nemo� and watch �The Price is Right!� To achieve the first goal, it will need to either be able to hookup to an external device, or include a VCR or DVD player in it. More discussion on this later. Coby TV Memorex TV eBay Search for TV’s
2. Speakers and CD Player: Of course, when we’re not watching television, we’ll be jammin out to some awesome tunes! Which is why I’ll need a CD Player. Also, I don’t count on the speakers on the TV to be entirely capable of being loud enough, so I will need an external pair of speakers. However, if the TV comes with a DVD player, I can eliminate the CD player for obvious reasons, therefore I would prefer a TV with a DVD player included. On the side of the CD player there is extra space for holding CD’s. Chosen speakers on Amazon.com
3. The Food: Of course, no entertainment center would ever be complete without a stash of grub, so obviously we need to have a big area for this stuff! Though the diagram is not incredibly detailed, you’ve got a Pringles can, some cookies, some chips, some Gummie-Bears, and possibly a beverage. Hopefully the janitors don’t have midnight snacks…
4. Suspended shelf: This is to hold the unfortunates, my books. ’Nuf said.
5. Foldout chair: I don’t expect myself to sit on the cold hard tile while enjoying �The Price is Right!� No, I will have a reclining foldout chair, that also comes with a sunshade, that perhaps I will place a discoball on. Just in case. The foldout chair will definitely be blue, because I like blue. It will fit in the space between the side and the suspended shelf.
6. Foliage: No area is complete without some greens! Just a small little plant or bush to cheer up the place and keep it natural!
7. Ponderosa Pocketchange Raffles container: O now this is a big part of the plan! I will discuss this later, but for now, this briefcase holds the entry forms to the raffle as well as the entrance fees and prizes!
8. Quote of the Day Board: A carry-over from last year, this dry erase board has the famous Quote of the Day on it, changed every morning to give everyone something to think about for the day. Also below the board will be a new Mormon-Ad, posted every week for inspiration!
9. The Pictures Door: And finally, the moment you’ve all been waiting for! What is possibly good enough to go on the inside of the door to grandest locker of all time? What could possibly add to the value of an already mind-blowing plan? All of the pictures of my girlfriends of course! Hahaha!

Not Pictured: Either because I forgot to add it to the diagram, or because I couldn’t figure out a suitable way to represent it using Omni Graffle, I did not include the power strip to give life to all of the electronics contained therein, and the blow horn which I will have to announce Ponderosa Pocketchange Raffles.

Incredible locker, huh? You only wish you could have had such a cool senior locker, huh? Huh pal? I’ve been plotting this one out for a long time, and yes, there still are some issues like funds and security, but I have a few weeks before school starts again and I hope to have it fully mapped out by that time. Note that the drawing is to scale (haha yes it’s true!) and I have already begun research on products that I want to include. But wait! There is one last thing to discuss!

Ponderosa Pocketchange Raffle:
Every Friday, as the culminating aspect of the Locker Extraordinaire, I will be hosting the Ponderosa Pocketchange Raffle, a raffle of small prizes raffled off every Friday to all those who enter. The prize for the week (such as $5 gift certificates to Burgers and Sports or Ponderosa memorabilia) will be announced each Monday through a flyer distributed to all seniors. Seniors then have the opportunity throughout the week to enter their names as many times as they wish, as long as the pay the accompanying 25c fee. Then, when Friday arrives, I will use the blow horn in my locker to get everyone’s attention, call for a drum roll, and announce the winner of that week’s raffle! The drawing will be right before the last period of the day, before everyone ditches and leaves. I have yet to decide whether the proceeds will go straight to the prize fund, or if they will be used to support a charity of some sort. But all in due time, I will have that figured out as well before the beginning of the year. Now this my sound like a strange or stupid idea to some, but with the help of some of my popular football friends, drumming up support shouldn’t be too bad. Way to go Ponderosa!

And there ya have it! The ultimate locker! I post this early because if any of you have suggestions or constructive criticism, please post it in the comments section! Otherwise, you may comment on how excited you are to see this locker for the final year of the best class ever, Class of ’05!

IEBlog

Opera, a Real Browser

Get Firefox

Examples: Chinese/Japanese site (?) with English image headers: CandyIMG.com | German blog with an English slogan: 127.0.0.1

Why are these sites in two languages (ie native plus English)? Most English readers are not going to speak the second and primary language the site is in, and isn’t it an inconvenience to native readers? Albeit, many international users run a higher risk of speaking a second language like English, but still, would it not be easier to have the whole site in the native language? Especially for script languages, such as Chinese and Japanese? Can anyone answer these questions? Just a little confused…

Terror in the Skies, Again?

1. A new bill being run through the Senate about P2P apps that �induce� crime; includes line-by-line rebuttal: http://www.corante.com/importance/archives/004563.html
2. IBM, Intel, Sony, Microsoft, Warner Bros., Walt Disney and Panasonic are now working together to stop you from recording HDTV broadcasts that you have already paid for. http://news.com.com/Tech%2C+Hollywood+heavyweights+create+content+coalition/2100-10253-5268315.html?tag=nefd.lede

Combine this with other things, like the DMCA, CD Copy Protection (gag me), or the RIAA lying about sales to make people think CD sales were down, when they weren’t, and you feel slightly belittled by everything. Of course, then you realize that none of this has affected you, and the customer has still one! Chalk one up for the educated consumer!

Enter the podq live Photography Gallery

podq

• This site is entirely run and operated by [2]Josh Lyman, an aspiring graphic designer who will be enjoying his senior year this year, and hopefully continuing on to Brigham Young University – Provo.
• I’m #15 and #20 on Google for searching “Josh Lyman”… stinking West Wing. Actually, I like the West Wing, Josh is cool, but he’s got a doofy haircut. I own 3 full DVD sets of the seasons. When my name is number 1, I will have a big party, and give something away free on my site.
• Font designated for display: Perpetua | Download Perpetua
  • Most users do not have this font installed, so you can download Perpetua here and install it. Isn’t this illegal? Well, the license says that the font is allowed to be temporarily embedded on a system, so as long as you uninstall it when you decided never to come back to my site again, you may use it.
• podq live is hosted by the highly reliable Equivity Hosting, and I in turn host people upon occasion.
• podq live is powered by the incredible open-source project WordPress, currently running version 1.3-alpha5 with several interesting and helpful plugins. The index page is heavily hacked out, but the rest is rather intact. Before WordPress 0.72, there were only SSI’s used to run this site, so the clouds have broken.
• On good days, the site validates as XHTML 1.0 Transitional, Section 508, CSS, and all that schwah.

When cell phones attack…â€?Verizon Kyoceraâ€? burns right buttock of teen – Engadget.com

Happy Fourth of July everyone! Celebrating America’s independence is always a fine day! I actually spent most of the day traveling back from my family reunion, but got home in time to see a terrific illegal fireworks show throughout my neighborhood, it was grand. Continue on America, and may God bless our troops.

“10.5 – If the Humanity doesn’t get you, the Camera Shake Will” “10.5 – NBC’s New All-Time Low” “10.5 – Why Didn’t California Sink Completely?” These are all possible titles for NBC’s most recent 2-part television movie, “10.5.” The movie was about a series of earthquakes in California and Washington that finally culminate in a grand earthquake measuring 10.5 on the Richter scale, dissolving half of southern California and leaving the viewing audience, um, laughing.

If you were one of the poor, unfortunate souls who did not manage to catch this show on it’s first run through, trust me, I won’t tell you anything you cannot already guess will occur throughout the entire show. To preface my comments, let me say that this was by far the worst movie I have ever seen in my entire life. Don’t get me wrong, it did have it’s benefits, such as rolling on the floor busting a gut, but the majority of it (99.9 %) was a bit iffy. If you haven’t seen it yet, I highly encourage you to do so, stretching before and after so that you don’t pull any muscles while laughing hysterically.

As stated before, the major premise of the movie was that several fault lines along California were being activated by a much deeper, fully connected fault that was going to cause a chain reaction and rip apart California. However, one bright seismologist (they call them geologists in the flick, oops) decides that this matches her theory, and she is suddenly elevated to adviser to the President to somehow stave off disaster. I’m not sure if it is the fact that mankind is somehow stopping massive earthquakes, or the fact that the solution is the entirely predictable use of nuclear weapons to �fuse the tectonic plates together� that got me. While this pathetic story line is going on, we are also following six other story lines, all of which are played by actors that could not have possibly more perfectly stereotyped their characters. From the teenage girl that complains while she is being swallowed into the earth to the woman governor of California who is on a feministic power struggle, every part of internationalized America is covered except for the indicted pastor who does drugs.

The cinematography is also one of the most notable characteristics of a film. I believe it could best be described as done by a five year old ADHD child who has recently discovered that not only can his camera zoom in and out, but he has Parkinsons as well. The camera did not hold a single steady shot for more than 2.5 seconds without either zooming in and out randomly, or panning from the first crazy angle to a second. There is quite possibly enough aimless movement
to make you nauseated, or at least disturbed by the insane amount that you are ridiculing the film. Also, during one portion of the slow-motion climax, the background noise mutes and the only music playing is the dramatic woman wooooing in the background; only countered by the fact that you really don’t care that people are falling into the earth.

And as if the movie wasn’t sickeningly trite enough, the movie ends like a cartoon: As the chasm of the earth rushes toward the ill-placed command post, the star of the show and her to-be lover fall to the ground, can’t get up, and it looks like they are doomed. Until the earthquake suddenly stops mere inches from there position. But happy day! It does, and everyone gets up, instinctively knowing that somehow the entire episode is over, even though they have been on constantly shaking ground the entire time. Parts of California are saved, the President sheds a tear and breathes a sigh of relief, and everybody is happy and with their loved ones. Please excuse me while i puke.

• Cannot Find Weapons of Mass Destruction (funny): http://www.coxar.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/
• GIF2TEXT: ASCII Art made easy!: http://www.degraeve.com/gif2txt.shtml
• in4mador generators: http://www.in4mador.com/index.php?cat=generators
• Newsmap (very interesting way of reading news): http://www.marumushi.com/apps/newsmap/

Enjoy!

The Graphical History of Unix

Now here comes what looks like a good movie for a change! “The Terminal” is about a man who comes from an Eastern European country that dissolved while he was on the plane to America. Thus, because of customs, he is not allowed to enter US soil and must stay in the airport. Somewhere between a comedy, a romance, and a feel-good movie, I’m definitely seeing this one!

Starring Tom Hanks and Catherine Zeta-Jones (oooooh ) the acting should be really superb. The plot is also original, something I haven’t ever seen before anyways. Comes out June 18th, o wait! That’s today!!! Well maybe I can swing up a date for tomorrow!

Watch the Trailer

Update: Well my parents went to see it, and guess what? They said it was boring! Dangit, I thought it was going to be good!

Fullscreen QTVR – Extreme

I flew out on Sunday afternoon, cuz that was the easiest way for me to get there. It was cool, cuz it had DirecTV service, so I got to watch �Cheap Seats� and the History Channel on the flight over. As we descended below the cloud layer, BAM! There was the Y on the mountain, Lavell Edwards Stadium, my dorms, everything! I got so pumped! My cousins picked me up, I stayed at there house for an hour, then went to my Grandma and Grandpa’s house to spend the evening. Got up the next morning, headed off to registration, and before you knew it, I was at EFY!

The whole week, for those of you who don’t know, is spent building you up spiritually, through classes, devotionals, musical programs, testimony meetings, all sorts of great stuff. You are also in a group of people your age, typically with a 2:1 Girl:Guy ratio. And there is NO way I’m complaining about that! The people in my group were so great, they were all so open and fun to be around, we were pretty tight by the end of the week. My roommate, Jeremy, in particular was awesome, and so were all the guys. The girls, like Kim, were also incredible for several reasons, such as:

• They were all kind to every guy
• They all wore modest clothing! Modest are the hottest!
• They all had strong testimonies and shared them

just to mention a few. And of course they were all excellent dancers!

Well, I guess I can’t really post all about the experience here, unless I wanted to type up my journal, which I don’t particularly feel like doing. But needless to say, my 120 pictures I shot in a matter of 30 minutes will be posted as soon as my new gallery is coded. Hopefully tomorrow! (snicker snicker ya right) But until then, everyone go to EFY!

View the Cameraphone Pics Gallery

Guess what students of Ponderosa! Your beloved advisement time (mine too) is changing next year. And it’s not for the better, it’s for the worse off the deep end of the swimming pool. In fact, the word that I prefer to use is (drum roll please) �DESTROYED!�

That’s right! No more travel time, no more spending time with your friends or wandering the halls, taking a much needed break from the drudgery of school. Instead, your advisement period will be chopped up into two sections, with five-minute passing periods in between. There will be no travel cards, you only get to go to a classroom during the passing period. You must then stay there for the extent of that section, and then go to another classroom for the second period.

I hate this. Today is a sad day for school.

It was by far, the most, top of the peak, tip of the iceberg with a freakin cherry on top, ga*yest survey I have ever taken. Ever. Period. Not only that, but the survey only took 20 minutes, 15 minus the instructions. And they kept me in the classroom for an hour, during which I could get nothing done. Except for write this rant about how ticked off I am. Dangit.

All in all, I feel very protected by the State Board of Education and am very thankful for their concern with my safety.

Now please go away.

What’s new that they mixed in? The biggest additions are the â€?Playlist Shuffleâ€? and â€?iMixâ€? features. Playlist shuffle is really cool because it gives me a feature that I’ve wanted in iTunes forever. Much like MusicMatch Jukebox, it will create a random playlist of songs, and allow you to pick and choose the ones you want to hear. Sure, you could use this at a party… if you were a geeky host behind your computer half the time deselecting songs. The only way to make this feature better is to allow certain songs to be selecting based on genre, BPM’s, etc. However, you can kind of achieve this through the use of Smart Playlists.

And iMix’s? Well, I suppose it’s cool, I can choose my playlists to publish onto the iTunes Music Store so others can listen to the preview clips (and Apple hopes, buy some of those clips) and have others rate your mix. I can see a power struggle right now for the top rated mix. Oh boy… too much â€?communityâ€? going on here. But if you want to vote for mine, haha, find â€?uplink’s Top Ratedâ€? and give it a 5!

Now what is this all about Apple and their �generous usage rights� (or something like that)? I like it, you can have the file on 3 computers, burn up to 10 playlists to CD’s (and then change it and burn some more) and so on. But check out what a little sidebar on the Apple website can reveal about their thoughts on Microsoft’s attempt to stop the insurge of piracy. Hmmm, seems the Senior Jobs does not think that Window’s Media Player music should be protected, so all of that music can float on over to iTunes. Huh. Works for me! No DRM! LOL, later days!

Neuhausplatz 200NC, “look ma, no case”

1. Ummm, Google has 100,00 servers in their farm. Um, ya, that’s alot Extremely interesting actually. Google Servers
2. Everyone knows how you can cheat on the Pepsi-product bottles to always get an iTunes song. Problem is, with everyone knowing about it, there aren’t too many winning caps readily available! I spent a good 2 minutes trying to find a good cap in Wal-Mart, with everyone probably wondering �What is that guy doing to those sodas?� O well, I found one eventually!
3. I turned off my computer last night, and lo and behold, the Num Lock key, which was lit when it was on, stayed on when I turned the computer off. Now I know that I still have current flowing through until I physically disconnect the power cord, but I have never seen keyboard lights staying on after a power-off. Who knew!
4. Yay! A new wishlist item! Now this is one nifty item I found in Wired Magazine (gotta love Wired). Instead of those cool little bouncing balls on your desk, it is a stylish-looking set of analog dials that represent a bunch of different items such as Emails you have, visitors to your site, network traffic, and plenty more. Called the “Executive Dashboardâ€? from Ambient, you choose the three of your favorite readings, and place the corresponding face plates behind the dial. The statistics are sent through radio waves. I want one of these!

Les grandes personnes aiment les chiffres. Quand vous leur parlez d’un nouvel ami, elles ne vous questionnent jamais sur l’essentiel. Elles ne vous disent jamais: â€?Quel est le son de sa voix? Quels sont les jues qu’il préfère? Est-ce qu’il collectionne les papillons?â€? Elles vous demandent: â€?Quel âge a-t-il? Combien a-t-il de frères? Combien p&eacutese-t-il? Combien gagne son père?â€? Alors seulement elles croient le connaître.

Translated:

Grown-ups love numbers. When you are talking to a new friend, they don’t ask about the essentials. They never say: �What is the song of your life? What games do you like? Do you have a collection of butterflies?� They ask: �How old are you? How many brothers do you have? How much do you weigh? How much does your father make?� It is only then that they believe that they truly know you.

Even though it may sound childish, if you take a second to step back and think about it, the idea is quite profound. As “grown-ups” we rarely ask questions that would lead us to actually understand a individual’s personality, but only a superficial collection of facts that make us feel that we know them on a statistical level. I just thought it was a rather pleasant thought, others may feel differently. But that’s what comments are for!

You have got to check out his site as well as his CSS Zen Garden creation (make sure you have a current good browser, again, like Opera or Firefox). I have to openly admit to almost directly applying some of the concepts from the CSS code to my new experimental style, organic full. And yes, it still is slightly broken as of this post… woops.

Anyways, just thought I’d let you know of this designer, if anyone else out there is looking for someone to follow, go for this guy! Thanks Shaun!

Rob Galbraith DPI: Sports Illustrated’s digital workflow

O and yes, they are mostly using Canons. I love Canons!

Gadget Madness: Kaba Kick

• /disk0s1/
• /disk0s3/
• /disk0s5/

Hmmm, very cryptic, but I figure I could handle it, looked like the way XP assigns partition names. I thought, â€?I have three partitions, I’ll just install it to the last one, since the HFS partition is the last one set up.â€? Note: This is the point when your finger is on the enter key and your mind is racing to remember if you backed up everything. I had So naturally, I picked the third choice, /disk0s5/. The installer immediately proceeds to unpack all of it’s necessary files, which takes about 20 minutes, afterwhich, it gives you a log-in and reboot option. I figured I had better check my XP installation to see if I just managed to overwrite anything, since it is a family computer. I booted just fine into XP, data looked great. That is, all except for my old â€?RESTOREâ€? partition, which now reads â€?Local Disk – Unformattedâ€?. Bu bu buuuuum! Woops! I just decompressed an entire new OS onto the restore partition of a current OS, and it wasn’t even the right filesystem! What a mess!

Well luckily, I have never even touched the restore partition since I got the computer, always thought about getting rid of it anyways. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense why /disk0s5/ was the restore partition, and not the expected HFS one. The main data partition I use is a primary partition using NTFS. The restore partition is a logical volume of a second primary partition, running FAT32. So if you think about it, the first primary partition would be 1, BUT the next primary partition would be 3 and the volume (restore partition) would be 5. Makes sense. But where did the HFS partition go, and why didn’t the Darwin installer pick up on that? But anyways, that’s my first adventure with my long haul of getting OS X on my PC! Anyone got any tips? It’s been an exciting day!

Alright, I admit it, I get some pretty crazy ideas sometimes. But here is one that I think might actually work, based off of some hard work other people have put into the area. I always hated Mac’s OS 9 and previous, mostly because they really did suck, crashed as much as PC’s, and weren’t at all logical. However, Apple released OS X, hired a couple of really nice designers, researched user flow, and put out an incredible product. Leo Laporte of The Screen Savers said �Once ya go Mac ya never go back!� and it is (frighteningly) proving true!
Unfortunately, even though it is great that Apple released iTunes and iPods to the Windows market, OS X hasn’t and probably won’t be released there. Technical details later. So here is my plan for getting Mac OS X (mostly) to run on an Intel-based PC. Crazy kid…

The Darwin Plan
The Overall Idea

Really quickly, here is a primer of how OS X works in half a nutshell. If you need a more detailed refresher, go to Apple’s site. OS X is based on several different technologies, the core of which is Darwin, the actualy operating system. Darwin is Open Source, because it is based off of FreeBSD, a Unix distribution. Anyone and everyone can get a hold of Darwin, which is great. However, the rest of OS X consists of Quartz, a UI rendering object, Cocoa and Carbon, application development objects, and Quicktime and Aqua, integrated with Quartz to produce the Aqua GUI that makes OS X so pretty. These parts are not Open Source, and Apple intends to keep them that way. So Apple won’t release OS X onto an Intel-based platform because it’s internal workings at the UI level (ie Quartz and Aqua) rely on specialty memory controllers only produced by Apple. And since Apple is kind and only allows themselves to produce such hardware and related matter, Quartz and Aqua won’t run on an Intel-based memory controller. This is why you cannot get OS X for your PC.

However, you can get Darwin, the base and core of OS X, as a port for an x86 (Intel) computer because it is Open Source and can be ported to such a platform. And that is where I come in. Did you notice my pretty graphic at the top of this? That is my roadmap to get wonderful OS X onto my PC! The plan is three-fold. First, get Darwin to run, then get KDE to run on Darwin, and then mod KDE sufficiently to resemble and act like Aqua. I’ve crossed out Quartz because Quartz is not available (sadly) for PC’s because of reasons given above. Visit the following resources
for more information about each object:

• Darwin 7.0.1: www.opendarwin.org
• KDE: www.kde.org
• Modding KDE: www.kde-look.org and many other sites

Darwin 7.0.1
Because Apple based the core of OS X off of Open Source, they are required to distribute the source code. This is a wonderful move for the rest of us and for Apple, because it allows everyone to collaborate and to work together to solve and improve huge amounts of code, and pave the way for greater OS’s in the future. A tad bit better than some other company’s â€?Innovationâ€? policies… Darwin is currently at version 7.0.1, which relates to the Mac OS 10.3 Panther release. The same ISO can be downloaded and burned to run for both PPC’s and x86’s. So I plan on grabbing this ISO and setting it all up on it’s own HFS partition on my hard drive. HFS is the filesystem that Darwin uses (for example, like NTFS or FAT32 for Windows) and it’s Hex code is 0xA8 for any of you who are wondering. Once Darwin is installed, I’m guessing that I will be left with an incredible shell, and that’s about it. No GUI, no nothin’. That’s where the next component comes in.

KDE

KDE is called a Window Manager, and is used extensively on Linux. It renders all those pretty little windows and toolbars and start buttons for you, so you don’t have to look at this all day long: bash user@a1-02-b3-92: user $ | Lucky for us/me, Linux is based on Unix, so there are people out there who are working on porting KDE from Linux to Unix/FreeBSD/Darwin. KDE will allow me to get past the Darwin shell, which, as totally comforting as it is, can get a little, um, texty. KDE is highly customizable in just about every fashion, and will replace Quartz and Aqua in the scheme of things. People have done some incredible things with KDE, including mimicking an OS X interface, which is in turn the next part of the struggle.

Modding the heck out of KDE

The final step, assuming I get this far, is to change just about every default facet of KDE. A new style, tons of add-on programs (Mosfet’s Liquid and SuperKaramba) new OS X icons, backgrounds, bars at the top and docks at the bottom, just about everything you can think of. I’m hoping that some Mac-fanatic out there has taken the time to also create a Finder-lookalike, so I can take advantage of that as well. Basically, everything in KDE will change, as well as some Darwin-level items too, since it is Open Source and customizable .

Conclusion

So yes, this is going to be one heck of an insane mission. But I think once I get there, I will love it! The beauty and stability of OS X with the extendability of a PC! Hooray, the perfect marriage! For those of you wondering, I did leave out a bunch of technical details. For example, I didn’t mention the Fink project, or the Qt libraries I will probably need. If you are looking for more detailed instructions and ideas, hit the web, or give me a holler. Also, if any of you out there have made more progress than this, please, let me know! I would love for any of my work to be cut out for me! Good luck everyone! I’ll keep ya updated on the situation.
Later days…

Darn cheaters on the internet.

examples:
eye http://www.idigitalemotion.com/cover.html
effectlab http://www.effectlab.com/

then it moved on to a very minimalistic style, that we are still in today. this site is an example of it. very clean, subtle colors, and well placed type are key characteristics. one of the main pushes behind this sort of style was a reaction to the grunge, hard set look, and also a look into the standards-compliant side of things. trends are mirrored in real life, as the store target seems to be a reflection (or vica-versa) of the web in style and hipness. wondering what the next style will be? go to target!

examples:
apple http://www.apple.com
overdesign http://www.9rules.com/whitespace/design/overdesign.php

now the web seems to be maturing, opting for a �best of both worlds� approach. standards-compliance is here to stayfor most web designers that are embracing the future, if you will , but the need for a few more colors in the palletteis also returning. thus the merge of cross-browser compliant css with the beauty of artwork.

examples:
fyrebase http://www.fyrebase.com/
firewheel design http://www.firewheeldesign.com/

it is also interesting to note the discordance between the writing style of such sites (in particularly blogs) with the layout and look they contain. often times, you’ll have ultra-minimalist, two colors, and twenty pages of text. a minimalistic style site should call for a minimalistic style of writing, otherwise you are contradicting yourself. this is not an opinion but a formulated matter of design. on the same token, if you have a very heavily graphical site, then
your writings should be longer, more involved, and varied. many designers and webmasters out there don’t seem to have caught the drift yet of the connection between image style and writing style.

i myself often have trouble with this concept, and also have trouble with trying to maintain a style that i like, since my skills are still developing. but hey, where would anyone be in the world if no one was progressing? thus, there are a couple of solutions. one, coordinate perfectly your writing style to the style you’ve made on the screen. two, coordinate it the other way around, pick your strong point. or thirdly, in some far off universe where content is entirely
seperated from your overall design, use css classes to seperate what content ends up on the screen from what doesn’t. but this is an entirely other topic out there for me to cover at a later date! good luck coordinating you incredible designers!

note all sites were chosen for what they looked like, though some do contain some good stuff to learn!

• feed on feeds v0.1.3 download zip (37kb)
• click on â€?view photosâ€? for screenshots

IO2Technology: Heliodisplay/ Interactive Free-Space Display

google
well google has some interesting things going on over there. they put out a copycat of friendster.com called delta 300’ (made it up) and lo and behold, a flight in flight from san juan to atlanta, georgia, including real time flight statistics, map, and position. woah. and did you know what the statistics are on people that go and “google” new people they meet to find out about them. and it returns results??? weird. on the other hand, google is extremely powerful, and indexes new sites very fast. my tiny little humble site is regoogled a few times a day. awesome!

rss feeds
speaking of google, google provides an rss feed about news updates. don’t know what a rss feed is? well basically, it is a small version of a site that applications can use to get the latest news/updates/items from your favorite websites. podq live provides an rss feed, just scroll down to the bottom of the menu and find the ’meta’ item. a few other cool rss feeds:

• google: xml
• dilbert: rss
• usgs recent earthquakes: xml
• itunes new releases: rss

so yesterday, i was driving to school, and it had been snowing because, um, it’s colorado. anyways, i was coming down the hill, when my rear end swung around and i spun out. no big deal, i’ve done it before. i looked at my tire, and sure enough, it was off, but not by much, so i just took it to get the tires realigned, i need to do it anyways. after the mechanics have a sword-fight with brooms, they come back and tell me that 4 different parts are bent, and they have to fix them all, for $918. um, no. i took it to one of my friends who is an excellent mechanic. one part was bent, but it is only going to cost $219 from the dealer, $100 everywhere else. i’m kind of bummed out tho, i have to come up with a bunch of money really fast.

i had to sell my camera (i’m crying about this!) on ebay, please someone bid on it! better yet, do the buy-it now option! canon rebel 2000 and a bunch of other stuff too. anybody want to help out?

o well, life is still good overall. hopefully i’ll scrap together a really quick entry for alex king’s css competition tonite. i had some really awesome ideas, but as is evident, a couple of events have kept me from pursuing. also, i added some new photos to my gallery, i’m really behind on those too, as i don’t have a scanner right now. hopefully on monday things will be better.

incredible chalk art

Hugues Hoppe’s home page

“We are living in a time of great change… Yet some things endure – courage and compassion, reverence and integrity, respect for differences of faith and race. The values we try to live by never change. And they are instilled in us by fundamental institutions, such as families, and schools, and religious congregations.”

Yes! Families and Religious congregations! Now if we could only get schools to be able to use the word “God”.

“We must stand with our families to help them raise healthy, responsible children.”

Again, families are the most integral part of society and life. Without families, everything falls apart. Don’t believe me? Ask a 10 year old who’s parents just got divorced if they are happy.

“Drug use in high school has declined by 11 percent over the past two years.”

Wow. Just knowing the figures from my school, that is impressive. Remember the PBS anti-drug commercial “Your brain on crack?”

[In regards to school drug testing] “The aim here is not to punish children, but to send them this message: We love you, and we don’t want to lose you.”

This one is hard to get from text, you have to have seen and heard his emotion while he said this.

“We will double Federal funding for abstinence programs, so schools can teach this fact of life: Abstinence for young people is the only certain way to avoid sexually transmitted diseases.”

Finally someone stands up and says this! It is not pills or latex that helps you be happy without kids and STD’s, it’s abstinence! So start teaching it schools!

“A strong America must also value the institution of marriage.”

Once again, families is mentioned as a key value of a united country.

“Congress has already taken a stand on this issue by passing the Defense of Marriage Act, signed in 1996 by President Clinton. That statute protects marriage under Federal law as the union of a man and a woman, and declares that one state may not redefine marriage for other states. Our Nation must defend the sanctity of marriage.”

Marriage is the union between man and woman. Got that? MAN and WOMAN? We must protect the sanctity of marriage. Thank you so much Mr. President!

[Marriage Topic] “If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process.”

Alright, let’s get down to business.

“It is also important to strengthen our communities by unleashing the compassion of America’s religious institutions.”

Very nice, I agree! Religious institutions offer some of the best life-changing help available, as well as offering a more stable lifestyle.

“Last month a girl in Lincoln, Rhode Island, sent me a letter. It began, ‘Dear George W. Bush. If there is anything you know, I Ashley Pearson age 10 can do to help anyone, please send me a letter and tell me what I can do to save our country.’ She added this P.S.: ‘If you can send a letter to the troops … please put, Ashley Pearson believes in you.’”

Right down to the youngest children in our society, I, and millions of others stand with Ashley Pearson. Thank you men and women of the military. And doesn’t that just melt your heart, whether you like the war or not?

“May God bless the United States of America.”

Thank you again for the reference to an almighty power who leads and guides our nation. In this speech, (according to my count) there are 7 or more references to God and religion. George Bush is not afraid to say this, and will stand by his own morals and beliefs that the Constitution defends. You’d be hard pressed to find so many references in many other State of the Union addresses.

So there’s my diatribe on this year’s State of the Union. Yes, I tend to actually get down to business and write in capital letters when I’m serious. Thank you America for making this country so strong and what it is today. Thank you President Bush for supporting and standing behind causes that you and America believe are just and right, no matter what the media says. And most importantly, I thank God, our Heavenly Father, for the amazing blessings and help that He offers this nation and its leaders. May He continue to guide us while we maintain our righteousness.
Good Night.

score! i’m going snowboarding tomorrow in lovely colorado. i’ve always gone skiing before, so this will be a new adventure and exciting. i don’t know, i guess i’m just kind of bored of skiing. and i’m going with my best friend, so it should be lots of fun. well, i’ll fill ya in on it later! toodaloos!

also, my first real publication/post/regular column will be published on january the 3rd. cuz i like the number three. and guess what? it will have to do with the law of thirds! o how interesting! well, after that, i should be posting every other day, to keep myself on schedule. well, see ya later!

bananas: [1]800×600.jpg [2]800×600.png [3]1024×768.jpg [4]1024×768.png
wheat waves: [5]800×600.jpg [6]800×600.png [7]1024×768.jpg [8]1024×768.png
subway: [9]800×600.jpg [10]800×600.png [11]1024×768.jpg [12]1024×768.png

• finish crisp layout out
• make crisp cross-browser compliant (ya right)
• bring back code for photo gallery
• make the other layouts cross-browser compliant (never)
• finish customization of template file
• reinstate custom entries and such i forgot what i meant by this so….

okay, so it’s been a few days, and i’ve been working hard to restore the site to what it was (or wasn’t) before the upgrade to wordpress 1.0. basically, almost everything to you guys is 90 % done, except for photos, which i’m waiting for a fellow blogger to update code with. also, all custom styles have been moved back to experimental status. why? because things changed in the template of the new wp, and so i have to accomodate for those changes. should be finished entirely by the end of the week, hopefully with a completed ’crisp’ template that will become the site’s new look. very experimental today. also, that date is pending the return of the code for the photo gallery, so hold your breath!

update (much much later, as in a year later): reading back over this, i realized that i had made this post using my cell phone and a text message. a few minutes later, my brother would accidentally drop the same phone 3 stories off my roof. 3 stories and cell phones usually don’t mix

1. so school can be canceled and
2. because it is fun to drive in (as long as there is no risk of hitting other objects)

during my thanksgiving break (my most favorite holiday btw) my family and i were up in jackson hole, wyo. there, we had my dad’s laptop, and my cousin’s laptop. my dad’s had no internet connection, but by some miracle, my cousin’s had a wireless gprs modem, which is like connecting your cell phone to your laptop and using it for an internet connection. in a bunch of ways. for example, it was slooooooooooooooower than molasses. it literally took me 23 minutes to sign on to msn. checking email took forever. one of those things where you get up and watch
a christmas special, then come back to see if it is done. and while all of that was occuring, i luckily had my cell phone, with service too! however, a bunch of my friends that i wanted to call were in different states. so either i couldn’t get online, or they weren’t online, or they weren’t at home, or i didn’t know their number. i suffered from what i would like to call, �communication seperation syndrome� or css. i couldn’t get a hold or talk to anybody, and i was about to die by the weeks end! i’m so used to being in constant communication and contact with everyone, either in person, or on the phone or over im, that a few days of no talk drove me insane! how sad is that? well, i’ve learned my lesson. not be so technology-dependent? noo, of course not! find a cell phone with instant messaging built in! coming soon: a review of all the free music players worth mentioning out there, and the ultimate champ.

1. the keebler fire in the first 30 seconds and
2. the text message i got from my three buds, amanda, amelia, and katie. thanks guys! you made the movie

my recommendation? don’t see it. the keebler fire was great, if you’ve seen it, you know what i’m talkin about. i was gonna do a thanksgiving layout for the site, but i ran out of time, so i’ll have a delayed one. then i’ll do one for christmas, new years, my b-day… etc. just have to have time.
well, don’t know what much else to say. o yeah! ponderosa is going to the state championships! don’t forget to listen to 850 koa or 9 news this saturday at 11 to watch/listen to ponderosa crush overland! rock on ponderosa!
later days all!

Estimating the Airspeed of an Unladen Swallow

what kind of world are we living in?

View the People Gallery

http://www.winsupersite.com/showcase/#windows

View the Flaura Gallery

View the Black and White Gallery

View the Artistic Gallery

View the Macro Gallery

needed: one who enjoys launching explosives onto mountainsides to start avalanches. pay is darn good.

sweeet! that’s what they do, they start avalanches, so a catalyst later (ie extreme skiers) don’t and kill themselves. nifty!