Cathy, leaving for a meeting: "Don’t eat the children."
Me: "I’m cooking spaghetti!"
Drunk Bastard
Can you imagine growing up and having to explain at every pool party why the letters D-B were on your shoulder? "Oh, that means my father is an a**hole."
Floyd County Georgia authorities arrested a father for what he did to his three year old son. Investigators say he tattooed the letters "D-B" on the boy’s right shoulder. The father says it stands for "daddy’s Boy." … the father admitted to police that he was drunk … [Source, WDEF News, Father Charged With Tattooing His 3 Year Old]
Google Study Tips for Students
Coder’s Block
Yesterday I had a huge coder’s block. My day started off with a very specific goal and was soon interrupted with a disturbing administrative problem that had me leave the house. When that was corrected and I returned my mind couldn’t get on task.
Usually I can get past a blockage by playing a game of Sudoku, something that makes me think but uses a different process than the way I solve programming problems. That didn’t work. In hindsight, I should have gone outside and worked in the yard for a bit. The exercise and fresh air would have done me well and cleared my mind. Wait. I think it was raining. Okay. Cleaning the garage, scrubbing the floors, or doing a home repair would have helped. I should have taken some time away from the screen.
Here’s hoping for a more productive day today!
I don’t think people know how to use the Internet
I was just looking at my stats today. They are fairly unremarkable as usual. 9 people today used a search engine to find Reality Me by searching for "naked women" and 3 people used a search engine to find Reality Me by searching for "naked females cutting tree chainsaw" for a total of 12 people mistakenly thinking this is good place for finding naked pictures of women. Somehow, of these 12 people, 14* actually ended up at 32 naked women with chainsaws which is a textual, not pictorial, post simply linking to a art piece with 5 women composited into looking like 32 women are wearing only boots and hardhats while cutting up a fallen pine tree. Here’s why I think people don’t know how to use the Internet: Of those 14 people, only 2 actually clicked through to the picture. So here’s my conclusion: a large number of people think using the Internet consists of doing a Google search and clicking on the link Google gives you and never going any deeper. So, if that is true, how should our web design/site presentation change? This seems to imply that typical hyperlinks don’t make sense to common users.
*These numbers are based on the WordPress Stats plugin and not a detailed analysis of the server logs.
Happy Birthday Evan!
Evan turns 4 today! Our midwife was on a roller coaster in Dollywood when Evan announced that he’d had enough of the womb. She rushed from the ride to the delivery room. As she helped Cathy deliver Evan, some of that roller coaster energy must have transferred to him because he runs non-stop with so much energy! And he is always so happy. I hope he holds onto that happiness forever. I love my children immensely. Evan really makes me smile. Many words on Reality Me are devoted to Evan.
What’s up with Wednesdays?
Why do Wednesdays have to be so packed full of obstacles?
Of Grasshoppers
Student: I wish my voice could be taken away.
Master: Just shut up.
We try
We try and sometimes we fail and we try again.
Aloe Vera? Walmart
I’m not a big Walmart fan. I know they do a lot of lost leader and if you are a thrifty shopper you can really get ahead. At one point they sold Prego cheaper than they purchased it. Still, the cost savings doesn’t make the shopping experience worthwhile to me. So last night when Amy was in pain from sunburn and we found ourselves without aloe vera, I went to Walgreens. That was a mistake. The selection was very limited. I have to say, Walmart would have been a far better choice because if this year is like previous years then there is a huge display of sunscreens and burn ointments all at the right price.
Shhhhhh
If everyone only spoke when spoke to, the world would be a very quiet place.
Ubuntu Accomplishments – Seesmic Desktop Install
The machine on which I do most of my work is not terribly robust. My work environment would make a good premise for a Disney movie..you know..old clunker equipment doesn’t look like it should be able to pull through manages to win the race. Anyway, Seesmic Desktop in all it’s glory was dragging this machine down. Everything would work fine but I needed one more reboot than normal throughout the day. On days like today, when the work was too intense, I just couldn’t run Seesmic Desktop (maybe not a bad thing). Now that I’ve successfully installed Seesmic Desktop on Ubuntu, it can run all the time and I can occasionally glance over at the streams to see what’s happening. Installing Seesmic Desktop on Ubuntu was incredibly easy. First install Adobe Air then install Seesmic Desktop:
- Open the Terminal
- Use wget to download http://airdownload.adobe.com/air/lin/download/1.5/AdobeAIRInstaller.bin
- Set the file to be executable: chmod +x AdobeAIRInstaller.bin
- Run it: sudo ./AdobeAIRInstaller.bin
- Accept any AIR updates
- Use wget to download Seesmic Desktop from http://d.seesmic.com/seesmic/SeesmicDesktop-0.2.1.air
- On the Ubuntu desktop, not terminal, look under Applications->Accessories or Applications->Other for Adobe AIR Application Installer and run it
- Select SeesmicDesktop-0.2.1.air and the normal Seesmic Desktop installer will run
That’s it! Frankly, I think Seesmic Desktop is performing much better on Ubuntu than Windows. My only complaint would be that it failed to put a shortcut in the Applications menu.
Update: I lamented that Seesmic Desktop needed an import/export feature to get userlists and data from one computer to another and @askseesmic responded with a document explaining now to move the xml file with the necessary data. It worked great! The userlists I had organized on Windows now are on Linux. Move the xml file from one machine to the other after backing up the original:
- Max OS X:
/Users/<username>/Library/Preferences/com.seesmic.desktop.client.<RANDOM>/Local Store/config/xmlAdapter.xml- Windows XP:
C:\Documents and Settings\<username>\Application Data\com.seesmic.desktop.client.<RANDOM>\Local Store\config\xmlAdapter.xml- Windows Vista & Windows 7:
C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\com.seesmic.desktop.client.<RANDOM>\Local Store\config\xmlAdapter.xml- Ubuntu & most Linux distros:
/home/<user>/.appdata/com/seesmic.desktop.client.<RANDOM>/Local Store/config/xmlAdapter.xml[Source, Seesmic Help Desk, Transferring Settings between Computers – workaround]
Ubuntu Accomplishments – Wacom Tablet
I have two Wacom tablets that I use for my art. My first tablet ever was a Wacom UD-Digitizer II serial tablet. I’m not even sure USB was around back then. This tablet was unbelievable at the time! Felt like I was writing on paper with a real pen or brush. Being able to use an eraser on the computer was remarkable. However, there were certain problems with its size, roughly 5×7, so I bought a Wacom Intuos serial tablet that is more like 12×10 inches. Tablets make computer art fun!
When I set aside a new machine for a replacement Linux server for my in-house development, I decided to actually use Ubuntu Desktop 8.04 and install Apache-MySQL-PHP on it afterwards. I’ve found myself using the Linux Desktop more and I think I can eventually migrate completely from Windows. Unfortunately, the computer I chose to do this with uses a mechanical mouse instead of an optical mouse. You know, one with the mouse ball that constantly needs cleaning. The mechanical mouse holds me back more than anything else from making the switch. Ergo, I decided to pull the Wacom Digitizer II out of the boneyard and see if I could get it to work. It was surprisingly simple.
Two support documents helped make quick work of getting the tablet functioning. 1) The community documentation for Wacom and 2) The community documentation for Wacom troubleshooting. The first gave me this simple line:
sudo apt-get install xserver-xorg-input-wacom wacom-tools
The tablet failed to work. The second explained that I needed to update /usr/bin/dexconf which would then rebuild /etc/X11/xorg.conf with these lines:
Section "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "stylus"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom" # USB ONLY?
# Option "Device" "/dev/ttyS0" # SERIAL ONLY
Option "Type" "stylus"
# Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
Option "USB" "on" # USB ONLY
EndSectionSection "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "eraser"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom" # USB ONLY?
# Option "Device" "/dev/ttyS0" # SERIAL ONLY
Option "Type" "eraser"
# Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
Option "USB" "on" # USB ONLY
EndSectionSection "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "cursor"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom" # USB ONLY?
# Option "Device" "/dev/ttyS0" # SERIAL ONLY
Option "Type" "cursor"
# Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Tablet PC ONLY
Option "USB" "on" # USB ONLY
EndSectionSection "InputDevice"
Driver "wacom"
Identifier "pad"
Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom" # USB ONLY
# Option "Device" "/dev/ttyS0" # SERIAL ONLY
Option "Type" "pad"
Option "USB" "on" # USB ONLY
EndSection# Uncomment the following section if you you have a TabletPC that supports touch
# Section "InputDevice"
# Driver "wacom"
# Identifier "touch"
# Option "Device" "/dev/ttyS0" # SERIAL ONLY
# Option "Device" "/dev/input/wacom" # USB ONLY
# Option "Type" "touch"
# Option "ForceDevice" "ISDV4" # Serial Tablet PC ONLY
# Option "USB" "on" # USB ONLY
# EndSection
Naturally I would have to comment out the USB references and uncomment the serial references. Then the serverlayout section had to look like:
Section "ServerLayout"
Identifier "Default Layout"
Screen "Default Screen"
InputDevice "stylus" "SendCoreEvents"
InputDevice "eraser" "SendCoreEvents"
InputDevice "cursor" "SendCoreEvents" # For non-LCD tablets only
InputDevice "pad" # For Intuos3/CintiqV5/Graphire4/Bamboo tablets
# InputDevice "touch" "SendCoreEvents" # Only a few TabletPCs support this type
EndSection
I rebooted and nothing happened. I realized /usr/bin/dexconf was a script and ran it. Upon rebooting I was stuck in VGA mode. This was looking like a failed experiment. On a whim I decided to make the changes directly to /etc/X11/xorg.conf and surprisingly, the tablet came to life! GIMP is suddenly fun to use!
The largest terrorist organization ever was an American group
Having grown up familiar with this terrorist group, I forget that our children may be completely unaware.
Questions of a Wanna Be Buddhist
As I explore a topic, I generate questions. I often record these questions in a notebook. As I explore Buddhism, I am recording my questions here.
At SGI-USA I have read about the Gohonzon which lends a bit of an answer to question 3 "when can I chant?" and specifically "can I chant while cooking bacon?" The Gohonzon is a replica of the scroll on which Nichiren Daishonin inscribed Nam-myoho-renge-kyo and his signature. The Gohonzon is used as a focal point for daily practice or gongyo. Further answering question 3:
The Japanese word gongyo literally means "assiduous practice." The practice of Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism is to chant Nam-myoho-renge-kyo, and recite portions of both the second (Expedient Means) and the sixteenth (Life Span) chapters of the Lotus Sutra in front of the Gohonzon. This is the fundamental practice of Nichiren Buddhism, performed morning and evening. [Source, Soka Gakkai Interational-USA, Gongyo]
Question 8: Does chanting have to be aloud or in a crowded space is it sufficient to chant silently within your head? Based on my own experience, I would say either is acceptable but chanting out loud is more effective.
Who is cousin Roofoo? (okay..that one was a joke) Kosen-rufu means to spread widely. "[Shakyamuni Buddha] meant that the spread of the Mystic Law would bring about peace in society and nature." [Source, SGI Library Online, kosen-rufu]
