Monday, April 30, 2007
pidgin
for those of you who are still using some ridiculously stupid IM client for windows, you are hearby ordered to download and install pidgin. then, in a week or so, rinse and repeat when the FINAL 2.0 comes out.
that's an order, soldier.
http://pidgin.im/
-----------------------------------
actually, i take that back - you're recommended to download now. you're only ordered to download the final release. that is all.
that's an order, soldier.
http://pidgin.im/
-----------------------------------
actually, i take that back - you're recommended to download now. you're only ordered to download the final release. that is all.
Tuesday, April 24, 2007
woot
at long last, the wedding planning is starting to take form. more and more each day, the picture in my head is actually starting to look something like a wedding. we're narrowing down photographers, sorting out cakes, pulling in musicians, hiring the midgets - crap, that part was supposed to be a surprise. oh well. in any case, it's shaping up. if we keep up the pace, we might actually be done on time, which would be a plus. i'm starting to get a little nervous about the ceremony itself, but i'm sure that will all be over once it's behind us. once we're finished and we get back from our honeymoon, we'll write a book about how to throw cheap weddings.
in tech news, apple announced that leopard (os x 10.5) won't be released until october. it's actually a fairly intelligent business decision if i have this figured out right. instead of banging out leopard and dragging their feet on the iphone, they're pooling their resources toward getting iphone ready and out (i almost said out and then ready, but that's the microsoft model). iphone = short term financial gain. leopard = long term cash cow. if they're smart (which they tend to be) then they'll use this time between now and october to create a buzz behind leopard and build anticipation. didn't work out so well for vista, which is actually another huge factor - by october, vista won't be stealing headlines anymore. guess that means i'll work on getting certified to support tiger (10.4) now and not wait for leopard. some time next year my darling wife may be kind enough to allow me a next generation macbook, killing at least three birds with one stone. err, laptop, that is.
in tech news, apple announced that leopard (os x 10.5) won't be released until october. it's actually a fairly intelligent business decision if i have this figured out right. instead of banging out leopard and dragging their feet on the iphone, they're pooling their resources toward getting iphone ready and out (i almost said out and then ready, but that's the microsoft model). iphone = short term financial gain. leopard = long term cash cow. if they're smart (which they tend to be) then they'll use this time between now and october to create a buzz behind leopard and build anticipation. didn't work out so well for vista, which is actually another huge factor - by october, vista won't be stealing headlines anymore. guess that means i'll work on getting certified to support tiger (10.4) now and not wait for leopard. some time next year my darling wife may be kind enough to allow me a next generation macbook, killing at least three birds with one stone. err, laptop, that is.
Monday, April 16, 2007
running the gauntlet with my new mac (long read)
So this whole Mac experience has been a very interesting one. I’ll try to remain as objective as possible, and keep in mind that my experience has been with an older, used Mac that I won on eBay. A lot of this would have been much, much different had a bought a brand new one (the much larger dent in my wallet notwithstanding).
UPS delivered the weathered package Friday afternoon. I can't say if ups or my oh-so-attentive seller caused the package to be in such form, but it looked like they used it for a goal post in a soccer match. The computer was wrapped tightly in bubble-wrap and surrounded by packing peanuts. Needless to say, there was enough static electricity to make the hair on my neck tickle. Guess the previous owner never heard that static was bad for computers. That was probably taught on the same day as the perils of tobacco smoke. I’ve only run into one other computer that smelled this bad. Also, at this point I notice an alarming rattle in the case. More on that in a minute.
Installing memory, a DVD burner, USB 2.0 ports, wireless card - all fit neatly and just as they would in a pc. Of course, I’m speaking only of fitting and not of working. I’ll come back to those topics as I discuss the headaches they caused. However, at this point I discovered the cause of the rattle - the hard drive bracket was not screwed into the case. Easy fix thanks to my hottie of a helper who, having no formal training, was able to readily identify a case screw up request. Good job, baby!
So, now that I’ve got the new parts in (and the rattle solved), it's time to connect it up and power it on. Most pc's employ a direct connection from keyboard to computer and a direct connection from mouse to computer. Not apple - the USB cable on my mouse was about 3' long, so this wasn't an option. The idea is to connect the mouse to the keyboard (via one of 2 USB ports) and the keyboard to the computer (by way of the supplied USB extension cable). Different, but good (except for the case of high performance pointing devices). In my situation, it will do just fine. Other connections (power, vga, and network) were standard.
Turning it on was my first real trial. The power light would blink, but nothing would happen. I was very concerned at first - logically, I assumed incompatible upgrades or dead computer, so I removed them all and replace the apple parts. Same problem. After trying other power cables and outlets, devices connected and disconnected, and all sorts of voodoo, I located a handy little button on the main logic board that reset the CMOS battery. Power-on issue resolved, upgrades restored. Now, on to the OS
The previous owner was kind enough to create for me a clean profile with auto-login and a very helpful (dead giveaway) password hint. Still, it was very sluggish. At this point I also found out that the wireless card I bought wouldn't work due to a change in chipset (and Apple's limited support for wireless NICs). I thought it would be best to wipe it out and start from scratch - so I did. However, not until the OS was finished installing did I run into frustration number two: the Mac was supposed to come w/tiger (10.4) but he shipped it with jaguar (10.2). for those of you unfamiliar with Mac OS versioning, this is not like a PC where "point" releases are under the same main release - 10.2 is to 10.4 as windows 2000 is to windows vista. So, I was stuck with an out of date OS. Finally I decided that since I bid on and won a Mac w/tiger, I owned tiger, and could legally download it (with the licensure of the pre-installed tiger that was on the Mac before I wiped it out). Thus begins the next gigantic obstacle...
I couldn't find a DVD version of tiger in a timely fashion, so my only option was the 4-CD route. The CD's came in the form of ".dmg" images (native to Mac, gibberish to pc). After trying several ways to get the .dmg files burned to CD on my PC, I resorted to trying to burn them from the Mac. I had to get them transferred tothe Mac first. Network: nope. Wasn’t working. Still don't know why. Only option: USB hard drive. I formatted the USB hard drive to fat32 (yes, my USB drive is now partitioned), copied the files over, and transferred them to the Mac. Then I found out that the upgraded DVD burner I installed was not recognized by the Mac. Patchburn wouldn't solve the problem (because it's way outdated under jaguar) so I had only one option: put the old CD-RW drive in, and burn. That did the trick, and I was on my way to tiger bliss.
Now that tiger was installed (and I was networked via crossover cable to the PC), I could grab patchburn for tiger and get the DVD burner working. That was actually quite painless. Wireless, on the other hand, is tricky. See, apple doesn't support wireless NICs other than their own "airport" cards (or those which have the same chipset manufacturer - Broadcom). The airport option is, well, not really an option in my opinion. Installing an airport card in this computer would cost me $100 and limit me to .11b speeds. No way. I read many reports of people who are using Broadcom chipset based cards in their Macs and decided that was the way to go. Best Buy supposedly has one for $40, but when I got there, I found out that they had just released a newer version of said card and it no longer has the Broadcom chip. now I have to either track down a Broadcom based wireless NIC or shell out the dough for option number 3: a sonnet branded, Mac compatible PCI wireless NIC (close to the price of a stinking' airport card, but at least it's 11.g). For now, it's sharing my pc's wireless connection over a crossover cable.
So, it's working now. I’ve found some cool applications to make it do all the stuff I need, and I’m learning my way around and getting it tweaked how I want it. This whole process has been a blast. I miss the challenge of learning how to fix a computer and overcoming obstacles, incompatibilities, etc... It reminds me of cutting my teeth as a pc geek. So, for all the frustration, I’ve already learned a lot about fixing and working on the Mac platform as it pertains to slightly older setups. This ought to be useful (and gratifying) when I work my way up to the newer stuff. The last remaining problem is where I’m going to make up the 3 hours of sleep it cost me last night to stay up past my bed time and do all of this :)
UPS delivered the weathered package Friday afternoon. I can't say if ups or my oh-so-attentive seller caused the package to be in such form, but it looked like they used it for a goal post in a soccer match. The computer was wrapped tightly in bubble-wrap and surrounded by packing peanuts. Needless to say, there was enough static electricity to make the hair on my neck tickle. Guess the previous owner never heard that static was bad for computers. That was probably taught on the same day as the perils of tobacco smoke. I’ve only run into one other computer that smelled this bad. Also, at this point I notice an alarming rattle in the case. More on that in a minute.
Installing memory, a DVD burner, USB 2.0 ports, wireless card - all fit neatly and just as they would in a pc. Of course, I’m speaking only of fitting and not of working. I’ll come back to those topics as I discuss the headaches they caused. However, at this point I discovered the cause of the rattle - the hard drive bracket was not screwed into the case. Easy fix thanks to my hottie of a helper who, having no formal training, was able to readily identify a case screw up request. Good job, baby!
So, now that I’ve got the new parts in (and the rattle solved), it's time to connect it up and power it on. Most pc's employ a direct connection from keyboard to computer and a direct connection from mouse to computer. Not apple - the USB cable on my mouse was about 3' long, so this wasn't an option. The idea is to connect the mouse to the keyboard (via one of 2 USB ports) and the keyboard to the computer (by way of the supplied USB extension cable). Different, but good (except for the case of high performance pointing devices). In my situation, it will do just fine. Other connections (power, vga, and network) were standard.
Turning it on was my first real trial. The power light would blink, but nothing would happen. I was very concerned at first - logically, I assumed incompatible upgrades or dead computer, so I removed them all and replace the apple parts. Same problem. After trying other power cables and outlets, devices connected and disconnected, and all sorts of voodoo, I located a handy little button on the main logic board that reset the CMOS battery. Power-on issue resolved, upgrades restored. Now, on to the OS
The previous owner was kind enough to create for me a clean profile with auto-login and a very helpful (dead giveaway) password hint. Still, it was very sluggish. At this point I also found out that the wireless card I bought wouldn't work due to a change in chipset (and Apple's limited support for wireless NICs). I thought it would be best to wipe it out and start from scratch - so I did. However, not until the OS was finished installing did I run into frustration number two: the Mac was supposed to come w/tiger (10.4) but he shipped it with jaguar (10.2). for those of you unfamiliar with Mac OS versioning, this is not like a PC where "point" releases are under the same main release - 10.2 is to 10.4 as windows 2000 is to windows vista. So, I was stuck with an out of date OS. Finally I decided that since I bid on and won a Mac w/tiger, I owned tiger, and could legally download it (with the licensure of the pre-installed tiger that was on the Mac before I wiped it out). Thus begins the next gigantic obstacle...
I couldn't find a DVD version of tiger in a timely fashion, so my only option was the 4-CD route. The CD's came in the form of ".dmg" images (native to Mac, gibberish to pc). After trying several ways to get the .dmg files burned to CD on my PC, I resorted to trying to burn them from the Mac. I had to get them transferred tothe Mac first. Network: nope. Wasn’t working. Still don't know why. Only option: USB hard drive. I formatted the USB hard drive to fat32 (yes, my USB drive is now partitioned), copied the files over, and transferred them to the Mac. Then I found out that the upgraded DVD burner I installed was not recognized by the Mac. Patchburn wouldn't solve the problem (because it's way outdated under jaguar) so I had only one option: put the old CD-RW drive in, and burn. That did the trick, and I was on my way to tiger bliss.
Now that tiger was installed (and I was networked via crossover cable to the PC), I could grab patchburn for tiger and get the DVD burner working. That was actually quite painless. Wireless, on the other hand, is tricky. See, apple doesn't support wireless NICs other than their own "airport" cards (or those which have the same chipset manufacturer - Broadcom). The airport option is, well, not really an option in my opinion. Installing an airport card in this computer would cost me $100 and limit me to .11b speeds. No way. I read many reports of people who are using Broadcom chipset based cards in their Macs and decided that was the way to go. Best Buy supposedly has one for $40, but when I got there, I found out that they had just released a newer version of said card and it no longer has the Broadcom chip. now I have to either track down a Broadcom based wireless NIC or shell out the dough for option number 3: a sonnet branded, Mac compatible PCI wireless NIC (close to the price of a stinking' airport card, but at least it's 11.g). For now, it's sharing my pc's wireless connection over a crossover cable.
So, it's working now. I’ve found some cool applications to make it do all the stuff I need, and I’m learning my way around and getting it tweaked how I want it. This whole process has been a blast. I miss the challenge of learning how to fix a computer and overcoming obstacles, incompatibilities, etc... It reminds me of cutting my teeth as a pc geek. So, for all the frustration, I’ve already learned a lot about fixing and working on the Mac platform as it pertains to slightly older setups. This ought to be useful (and gratifying) when I work my way up to the newer stuff. The last remaining problem is where I’m going to make up the 3 hours of sleep it cost me last night to stay up past my bed time and do all of this :)
Wednesday, April 11, 2007
coming out of the closet
i bought a mac. no, i'm not completely a mac-guy, i'm just mac-curious. enough with the gay jokes; it's giving me the willies.
last friday i won an older powermac G4 on ebay for $200. i'd been tossing around the idea of getting one, or maybe doing something creative to get myself a cheap, usable mac that will run tiger and any future cats apple decides to cough up (pun definitely intended). the whole point of this exercise was to begin educating myself on the mac os and become more familiar with supporting it. eventually, this will make me more marketable as a geek. i've already picked up some ram and usb 2.0 ports in anticipation. i just found out that if not now, certainly in the future, i'll need a DVD drive in order to install the newer releases of osx, so i've got to pick one of those up (about $30 at newegg).
gaim, a program near and dear to my heart, has just changed names due to a legal run-in with a media giant. little did i know, that run-in has been going on for a while (read link on "changed names"). it's a clever little title, though. it's been a while since i read the news feed for that site, so at the same time i read that, i also read about a mac version of the same program. i was elated, to say the least. maybe they'll change their slightly long-in-tooth name as well.
ok, off to work. be good, chilluns.
**********************
EDIT: $30 lightscribe drive!! looks like the pc gets an upgrade (i'll move my current dvd drive over to the mac)
last friday i won an older powermac G4 on ebay for $200. i'd been tossing around the idea of getting one, or maybe doing something creative to get myself a cheap, usable mac that will run tiger and any future cats apple decides to cough up (pun definitely intended). the whole point of this exercise was to begin educating myself on the mac os and become more familiar with supporting it. eventually, this will make me more marketable as a geek. i've already picked up some ram and usb 2.0 ports in anticipation. i just found out that if not now, certainly in the future, i'll need a DVD drive in order to install the newer releases of osx, so i've got to pick one of those up (about $30 at newegg).
gaim, a program near and dear to my heart, has just changed names due to a legal run-in with a media giant. little did i know, that run-in has been going on for a while (read link on "changed names"). it's a clever little title, though. it's been a while since i read the news feed for that site, so at the same time i read that, i also read about a mac version of the same program. i was elated, to say the least. maybe they'll change their slightly long-in-tooth name as well.
ok, off to work. be good, chilluns.
**********************
EDIT: $30 lightscribe drive!! looks like the pc gets an upgrade (i'll move my current dvd drive over to the mac)
Sunday, April 08, 2007
happy jesus-is-alive day
i just thought that i would take this opportunity to inform you all that i have the most awesomest fiancé in the world. ever. no, for serious. i had the great honor and joy of taking her out on a date yesterday to celebrate her spiritual birthday and just remind her how much i love and appreciate her. she cooked me chicken today, because she's just that cool.
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
wedding stuff
this morning i received an email from the church that's hosting our wedding... looks like there's yet another form to fill out. that's not the bad part, actually. what's worse is that the form outlines additional fees we weren't expecting for things like tables and chairs. we also found out recently that this place doesn't even have a sound system, so we'd have to hire a DJ. i think we're going to can the idea of having the reception there, save ourselves a few hundred dollars, and move it to one of our church buildings nearby. the drive from the church would only be about 2 miles, and it wouldn't cost us anything. it might even feel a bit like "home" considering it's where my men's group meets, and where the awana kids meet on sunday nights. lauren and i are very familiar with that old building. shoot, i just realized that it might work out where we could have the inflatable jungle-gym set up for the kids to play in! maybe that's not such a good idea, considering my cousins.
i'm glad that planning a wedding is something you only have to do once in a lifetime.
i'm glad that planning a wedding is something you only have to do once in a lifetime.
Monday, April 02, 2007
i've been thinking...
for some reason that i don't yet understand, i sat down at the computer and decided to start a new blog. whatever that reason may be, there just might be some benefit to this brand new shiny blog o' mine. maybe since it's new, i'll actually use it! maybe i'll start blogging before bedtime whenever i do decide to use it. i might even put something worth reading in here from time to time.
i had a very brief conversation with a security guard at work today. while i don't find this man to be particularly religious (at least not in the sense that it pervades his vocabulary or general disposition), i do know him to be at least familiar with church and with religiosity. he quoted a verse this morning as i walked to the office that's had me thinking off and on all day
i can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
many of you will readily recognize this from paul's epistle to the philippians. i immediately went back in my mind to the vivid memory of the time i first heard it, from the lips of my grandfather while we were working in the heat of the summer in wilmington. i even remember pointing out the nearest heavy construction vehicle and asking immaturely if jesus could help him lift it. obviously, the spirit did no such thing on that day.
i didn't think of it again until february of last year, when i was staring at a bottle i'd been holding in my hands for half an hour until its contents were unpleasantly hot. at least, i assume so - i never did drink that bottle. i can do all things through Him who strengthens me. while it was sorely misapplied to the circumstances, it did help me get through that night and many to follow. i somehow felt like God had empowered me to resist the tempation.
fast forward to the parking lot at work. i smirked and laughed at this security guard for his sentiment and i strolled on down the hill to work, thinking "he's missing the point..." i even shared the sentiment with my fiancé in the car tonight, at which point i realized something startling: he was closer to the point than i ever was. rewind a bit in that good old Book and see what's really going on here.
I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
this little spiritual journey has now brought me back to a sermon that chris gainor delivered a while back, one of the points of which was that it's really hard to make a big deal out of God when you're complaining about your circumstances. y'all, i'm a complainer - and i've got it good. but even if our present circumstances make us feel like complaint is justified, don't we have a greater hope that calls us back upward? remember that all things work for the good of those that love God, the same God that did not spare His only Son, and therefore would freely give us all things if we just ask! we are conquerors. we are certainly not whiners.
see: Romans 8
i had a very brief conversation with a security guard at work today. while i don't find this man to be particularly religious (at least not in the sense that it pervades his vocabulary or general disposition), i do know him to be at least familiar with church and with religiosity. he quoted a verse this morning as i walked to the office that's had me thinking off and on all day
i can do all things through Him who strengthens me.
many of you will readily recognize this from paul's epistle to the philippians. i immediately went back in my mind to the vivid memory of the time i first heard it, from the lips of my grandfather while we were working in the heat of the summer in wilmington. i even remember pointing out the nearest heavy construction vehicle and asking immaturely if jesus could help him lift it. obviously, the spirit did no such thing on that day.
i didn't think of it again until february of last year, when i was staring at a bottle i'd been holding in my hands for half an hour until its contents were unpleasantly hot. at least, i assume so - i never did drink that bottle. i can do all things through Him who strengthens me. while it was sorely misapplied to the circumstances, it did help me get through that night and many to follow. i somehow felt like God had empowered me to resist the tempation.
fast forward to the parking lot at work. i smirked and laughed at this security guard for his sentiment and i strolled on down the hill to work, thinking "he's missing the point..." i even shared the sentiment with my fiancé in the car tonight, at which point i realized something startling: he was closer to the point than i ever was. rewind a bit in that good old Book and see what's really going on here.
I rejoiced in the Lord greatly that now at length you have revived your concern for me. You were indeed concerned for me, but you had no opportunity. Not that I am speaking of being in need, for I have learned in whatever situation I am to be content. I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me.
this little spiritual journey has now brought me back to a sermon that chris gainor delivered a while back, one of the points of which was that it's really hard to make a big deal out of God when you're complaining about your circumstances. y'all, i'm a complainer - and i've got it good. but even if our present circumstances make us feel like complaint is justified, don't we have a greater hope that calls us back upward? remember that all things work for the good of those that love God, the same God that did not spare His only Son, and therefore would freely give us all things if we just ask! we are conquerors. we are certainly not whiners.
see: Romans 8
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
