Entertainer Media Center

I used to loathe JavaScript. It was a language that looked ugly, had no obvious structure, and seemed like a toy that web developers would use. Then I read “JavaScript: The Good Parts” by Douglas Crockford and my viewpoint changed for the better. I’ve now seen that JavaScript can still be the hopeless mess that […]

I used to loathe JavaScript. It was a language that looked ugly, had no obvious structure, and seemed like a toy that web developers would use. Then I read “JavaScript: The Good Parts” by Douglas Crockford and my viewpoint changed for the better. I’ve now seen that JavaScript can still be the hopeless mess that […]

A few times during UDS, we've talked about setting up a Launchpad development environment. I think it'd be great if the community really got involved in making Launchpad better, and I don't think I'm alone on the Launchpad team thinking that. ... [More] However, setting up the development environment is kinda scary. Among other things, the script that sets up a Launchpad development environment (rocketfuel-setup), deletes all postgres databases to set up its own, edits yours /etc/hosts and your apache configs, and adds some PPAs that may interfere with your system packages (although it's been a while since it did that to me.) To combat this, and allow me to fart around on my system on the weekends without breaking my environment, I do all my development in chroot environment. This means Launchpad can eat my system, and my system can't eat my Launchpad. I've been working this way for almost 8 months now, and have found it to be much better than sharing spaces. The one thing that I have had a problem with is the relationship between my desktop and the chroot. I figured that maybe I'd reach out to the community and see if they can recommend a path for putting some Compound W for some development warts I have. When I start up my computer to work on Launchpad, I open two terminals and a gvim. Both terminals become chroot terminals by my typing schroot which then promptly get navigated to have my current branch's tree as the working directory. This means that these terminals are now utterly useless for anything but work in the chroot, which can be good for focus, but if I need to do anything else, I have to open another terminal to do it. Having lots of terminal windows open is generally a bad thing for focus as well. Also, I run lots of Windmill tests. Windmill needs a browser, which needs an X display. I've been using Xnest -ac :1 &!; metacity &! outside of the chroot, and then setting export DISPLAY=:1 in my chroot in order to get X forwarded over. This is really sub-optimal, since it's a lot of crap to set up to run Windmill (which in and of itself is a lot of other crap to set up). I would love nothing more than to modify rocketfuel-setup to be created in a chroot if I could find an easy way to work outside the chroot and just forward certain commands over to the chroot. I'm sure some server sysadmin has a great method for doing this. If you have a solution, a bribe can be arranged. If you're at UDS right now, even better. [Less]

I went out and bought a Cricket a600 modem for the cases where my internet goes out. There are all sorts of howtos on getting it working, including one my friend Sean wrote. However, these were really complicated, and there's no way around that. ... [More] It's not something an end-user could do. Enter the Koala. Setting it up on Karmic is a snap. First, apt-get install usb_modeswitch. I think there might need to be a reboot in there, but I'm not sure. Then, plug in your modem, and right click on "Edit Connections..." and click on the "Mobile Broadband" tab. Add a connection, walk through it, and you'll find that Cricket is one of the options. Then that's all there is to it. My one request is that when I plug it in, it would disconnect the wireless connection when it connects to the mobile network, just because if I'm connecting with the Cricket modem, it means that wireless is flaky. Currently, I just go up and disconnect it manually, but it'd be nice if it was automatic. [Less]

This is going to be a very short post, followed by a longer post after I've thought a little more. I like video games, and I've liked them since I was a kid. I've dabbled in writing video games for a long time. I've looked a few times into writing ... [More] a DS/DSi game (I have a good idea). Last night, I compared it to what it took to make an iPhone game: To apply to maybe create a DS game, here are the guidelines: http://www.warioworld.com/apply/ To get started writing an iPhone app, go here: http://developer.apple.com/iphone/library/navigation/index.html?section=Resource+Types&topic=Getting+Started Shame on you Nintendo. Shame on you. [Less]

Before I go through this review, I must mention that I was given a Sony Reader Touch for the purpose of writing a blog post about it. However, the below review is an honest one. I had my wife read it through to make sure I haven't missed any ... [More] criticisms, constructive or not. The first thing I did when I unboxed my Sony Reader Touch was turn it on. The battery complained about being low (the battery meter showed it was empty), but I used it for 2 days without charging it and had no problems. The Reader doesn't come with a charger, and so you'll either need to purchase one or be happy with charging off USB. I own a Sony PSP, and that charger is the same, so it fit right in with my custom charging station. It didn't come with a nice case, but rather a fabric sleeve. Fortunately, a bit later I recieved a nicer "book-like" case that also has a reading light, which was fortunate since the Reader reads in the dark as well as a book does. This new case makes me feel more confident about carrying it around, and especially travelling with it, since US airport security tends to make me feel hurried so I often throw stuff back in my bag, re-arranging it later. On plugging it in, it appears as a USB mass storage device. I did some googling around and found all sorts of fun sites offering free epub format books. I downloaded a few, and commenced reading "Tom Sawyer" by Mark Twain. Reading was comfortable, and I didn't feel like I was reading a screen at all. It doesn't make up for the feel of a book in your hands, but it's still an okay compromise. The simple fact that I can carry more than one book around easily is the big plus for me, since I find my travel means long plane flights where I have a lot of time to read, but don't want to lug more than 2 books around. After reading "Tom Sawyer" I broke down and installed the Sony Reader Software in my Windows VM and used the Sony book credit to "buy" a couple of books. The first was a book I was already reading in physical form (you know, because you don't actually own the book you bought in digital form, DRM and all that). That book was "Anansi Boys" by Neil Gaiman. I ended up finishing the book on the Reader, which was about halfway done when I made the transition. After doing some more reading, I started looking at making my own epub books. I found the manual for an LDS class I teach in another format, and with the help of Calibre I was able to convert it into epub format. The CSS it generated was a little funny, but ultimately not a big deal. I then proceeded to read through the next lesson I was to give, making notes with the stylus where I needed to. The touch screen could be a bit more responsive, but I wasn't in a hurry to jot down my thoughts, so it also wasn't a huge hindrance. The lack of a network connection is a feature to me, not a bug. It means my battery lasts longer, and no Big Brother access to remotely delete my books. I haven't tried out any of the external memory slots, since I didn't really have a need. I only have ~40 books or so on it, and that's really all I need at any one time. I also didn't try out the audio capabilities either, since I'm pretty attached to my MP3 mplayer as it is. Of the things that I would change about it, there is only one thing that is absolutely annoying to me. The page turning gestures are backwards. Seriously, backwards. A gesture moving from left to right goes to the next page, and a gesture from right to left goes to the previous page. It drives me so crazy that I don't even use gestures to turn the page. I just use the buttons. I'd also like the ability to turn the touch screen off entirely, so all I have is the e-ink surface, so my battery lasts longer. I usually don't need the touch screen, but when I do, it's nice to have. Overall, I'm glad to have the device. Will it replace actual books anytime soon? Probably only for people who don't really read. Of course, I still buy vinyl when I can, and prefer LPs to CDs or mp3s. It's still valuable for the convenience factor, although I'm still not sure the price is right. $300 for a ebook reader seems steep, and the prices of ebooks are still pretty steep as well (I'm looking at you O'Reilly...). I think there will need to be some maturing in the price category, but for the most part, I'm quite happy with my Reader. [Less]

Recently, my workflow with Bazaar has adapted to use bzr-pipeline, because much of the work I'm doing is based upon prerequisite branches. This means I find myself doing a lot of switching between pipes, sending pipes to Launchpad for review, etc. ... [More] I have added the following aliases to ~/.bazaar/bazaar.conf in order to make my life easier. next = switch-pipe :next prev = switch-pipe :prev send-pipe = send -r branch::prev.. diff-pipe = diff -r branch::prev pipes = show-pipeline Also, if you haven't used bzr-pipeline yet, try it out next time you're trying to break your work up into many smaller branches. [Less]

Tonight I acquired a Korg Nanopad midi drum pad while at Guitar Center (I actually only went in to look at 4 track recorders, walked out with plenty of cables, a Boss BR-900CD recorder, and the previously mentioned Nanopad). I made sure of the ... [More] return policy on the Nanopad, since I really hate buying gadgets only to find out they either don't work with Linux or work with more coercion required than I am willing to spend. Luckily, I plugged this little guy in, and it was immediately detected by the kernel, and showed up in lsmod as Bus 006 Device 002: ID 0944:010e KORG, Inc. I usually then Google the USB ID to see if anything might come up, but nothing interesting did. I was hoping there'd be software in the Ubuntu repos that might work with this, as I was feeling particularly stoked about compiling or packaging something myself. A quick apt-cache search midi drum yielded some candidates. I installed the first one, Hydrogen. I'd played with it before, but didn't find it particularly compelling. I started it up and started hitting the pads on the Nanopad. Nothing. Of course it wouldn't be that easy. So I went to File->Preferences, clicked on the "Midi System" tab, and, as an option to "Input", I saw "nanoPAD MIDI 1". After selecting that, I was making beats. Linux has come a LONG way. [Less]

Launchpad is open source today. All of Launchpad is open source as well, where it was before announced that some parts would remain proprietary. It's all there. This makes me happy. That is all.

The Tarmac team is more than pleased to announce the release of Tarmac 0.2. Tarmac has received many improvements and features in the last few months, and, thanks to the efforts of many who sprinted yesterday, Tarmac 0.2 has had some great polish ... [More] applied to it as well. Tarmac now supports the ability to run a command on merge previous to commit, and, should that command fail, reverts the change and alerts the user to the failure. Tarmac supports this through its new plugin system. Tarmac 0.2 is also packaged with a Commit Message Template plugin to enforce a standard commit message on merge, and a plugin for notifying the CIA.vc service of new merges. Other notable features include a web interface for checking the status of Tarmac, improved conflict handling, updated documentation and preliminary Windows support. Also, Tarmac now properly attributes the author of the merge commit to the author of the last merged revision. For a list of all bugs fixed, see the Tarmac 0.2 bug list. [Less]