Is the HD Up?

This one's for the locals.

The weather has been not so nice lately. Thousands of people were, or still are, without power for days after our weekend storm. I was lucky enough to only lose power for an hour.

With that stage set, I turned on the TV tonight and found no stations. I ditched cable and only have OTA digital and HD now. I immediately began cursing my antenna. Surely the power surges from all of the work going on in the state killed my antenna I thought. I switch the antenna over to the analog in put and was able to get something out of it. The antenna was fine.

I then immediately began cursing my TV. Stupid TV, it must have blown the ATSC tuner as I wasn't getting any signal. Ahh, but wait. With some more playing, I found FOX, on a different channel, so the ATSC tuner was working. So what was the problem.

I went to the trusty computer and did some digging. Turns out, the HD antenna farm near Walker was again without power and that was the source of the TV with no signal. My gear was working, thankfully, and now I have a resource to check to see if the HD signals are up. CFU plots OTA HD reception and is your one stop to see if the HD stations are up or down.

5 of The Now

• LCD Soundsystem - North American Scum [In college, I went on a 3 week study to central mexico. One of the things that really stood out from that trip was how much they hated that people in the US called themselves Americans. It's the perfect example of us being self-centered. There are a lot of Americans, including those in Mexico and Canada. They wanted to make sure we understood we were all Americans. That said, I think the lower half of North America would rather be left out of the topics in LCD Soundsystem's new track. I think LCD has the US squarely in their sights when they talk about North American scum. It's a great, dare I say, think piece, that hopefully opens a few eyes, and ears.]


• Aesop Rock - All Day [This is one of the Nike+ Mixes which I've been quite happy with so far. One of the comments on iTunes describes this as "nothing more than a crappy techno album". Uhh what? He's correct in that the lyrics are few and far between, but this is a mix about the run, not about rockin' the stage. It does tend towards the dancier side of hip-hop, but again, that's the point. They have to maintain a consistent flow for 45 minutes and Aesop succeeds. I'm really digging this. While we're talking about Aesop, be sure to subscribe to the Definitive Jux podcast.]


• Nelly Furtado - Say It Right [I'm still a sucker for Timbaland, even if he borrowed some beats for the other Furtado tracks. I heard this one enough on the radio to know I liked it and I listen to the radio infrequently enough that I'm probably not as tired of it as those that listen often :) I bought this off iTunes. Too bad the quality is crap and sounds muddier than a farm field in March. You can hear it in the sample, go listen.]


• Trentemoller - Take Me Into Your Skin [The problem with this track is that it is too good. It is the first track on the album and it sets a bar that is tough to get back to. Amazing music.]


• Tycho - The Disconnect [This one isn't available on iTunes but you can listen on his website. If you like it, he does have an album on iTunes
  and Amazon. If you like Tycho's minimal style, you'll like the rest of Trentemoller's album as well.]

Watch Now, Not on a Mac

I'm excited because my Netflix account has been enabled with their new Watch Now service. I've been checking daily since the announcement. I don't know if it had anything to do with it, but I actually did a search on the site for Watch Now and then when I followed the search results it told me my account was now enabled. Perhaps they enable you if you go looking for it?

So, I have it, but I'm pretty limited on how I can use it. First, no Mac support at all. You need Windows and you need Internet Explorer. Firefox isn't supported. Luckily I can boot in to XP through the magic of Boot Camp.


Their auto-detect for speed has me at good quality. I'm on 5Mb DSL for reference.


I love that Netflix added this service for free. More to follow as I put the service through the paces.

Be Concise, Be Consistent

Some people wonder why other people can't get the hang of computers. They find using computers to be pretty easy and can't fathom why others have such a hard time with them. I'm not one of those people. Plenty of people think computers are hard because they are. They're complex, they're confusing, and the worst part is that simple investments at design time could go a long way towards making them easier to use.

Today I'm going to pick on Foxit Software, makers of the great, free, PDF reader for Windows. Like many of you, I grew tired of the bloat in Adobe Reader and decided to try things without it. While installing Foxit Reader, I was presented with an installer that, on the surface, looked just fine. However, if you take a gaze with a critical eye, you'll notice plenty of things that us geeks just accept but confuse the crap out of non-technical users.

In the first screenshot, we're being asked to choose a folder to install our application to. A reasonable default is preselected.

My problem is the Disk Space section. First off, what's a disk? I thought we were picking a folder? Then we see some stuff about total disk space and free disk space. I'll be honest, I've seen these things hundreds of times but at first I thought the total disk space was how much the app was going to burn!

It took me a bit to notice that the "disk to use" info was down in another section of the window. Why is the focus of this window the disk space indicator? Shouldn't the focus be the folder to install to and the disk space required? They don't even give me any indication if the selected disk has the appropriate room to install. I guess I could do the math, but wait, can I? I see I have 2205 MB available and the app is going to use 2.5M. Now, I know they are using the same units here, and you know they are using the same units, but do non-technical users know that an MB and a M are going to be the same in this case?

Why didn't they use the same units? Why did they include a space on one and not the other?


In our second screeshot we see something called a destination location. What's that? I thought I just picked an install folder. If you want to call it a destination location, then ask me to pick a destination location, not an install folder.

Now, a lot of you have already cursed at the screen and decided that I'm overly critical. If you have, good. I writing this post to you. This stuff does matter and it does confuse people. It would have taken about 20 seconds to have changed the installer at design time to use consistent terminology and put focus on the things that needed focus.

IE7 UI Blunders

I've used IE7 for a little while now and it's high time I complained about it! :)

For the first round of complaints, I'll address my UI hot button. Here's where I think they made some blunders.

1. Separate reload and stop buttons - I think these should be the same button.


2. Reload and stop buttons not near the page navigation - This one bothers me the most. These buttons are frequently used while going back and forward. Right now, they're hanging out in no-man's land between the location and search boxes. Why are they there? I don't understand the placement.


3. Can't change the size of the address box - Anything beyond the first 20 or 30 characters is just script arguments and other junk that means nothing to users. IE7 makes sure you see it all.


4. Can't change the size of the search box - Longer searches are useful to see. I could find no way to make this box bigger. Making the window bigger only makes the address box bigger. Safari lets you slide between these two boxes. A bigger search equals a smaller address. Perfect!


5. Drop box on home button - How often do I need to change my home page? Almost never. How often to I go to my homepage? Dozens of times a day. How often would I miss the home button by 2 pixels and get the silly drop-down? Often.


6. Multiple home pages? What's the difference between an additional home page and a regular link? Why couldn't I create a Home folder of links if I wanted multiple home pages? Maybe the Microsoft guys, with their huge net worths from cashing in stock are under the impression that most people have multiple homes and therefore need multiple home pages. I have microsoft.com for my Redmond estate, weather.com for the beach house in Maui, and skireport.com for the Whistler condo. Aww, the more I thought about this, the more I thought it might be a cool idea, but I pretended it wasn't long enough to write the Whistler condo joke.
   

It's not all bad. I love the blank piece of tab that you click to make a new tab.

Link The Fabulous Manual

I think every homeowner has a drawer or a shelf full of the manuals from their house. Things like, how to change your garage door code and cleaning maintenance for your clothes washer. They are full of useful, but rarely used information. You'd like to just toss the manuals, but you can't...or can you?

Recently I needed to change my garage code. I was unable to find the printed manual so I went online, expecting to be disappointed. Thankfully, I wasn't. My keypad manufacturer had a great set of manuals online in PDF format. Further searching showed that plenty of my printed manuals could be found online. I expect this from electronics, but household applicances have lagged behind a bit.

Wanting to simplify things a little, I figured I can download these manuals, store them on my comptuer, and whip up a quick web page to let me find them quickly.


He's a screenshot of the start of that idea. I plan to replace my quick house drawing with an actual picture of the house and I'll probably not only link the downloaded manuals, but also the manufacturer sites for reference.

I doubt I'll really toss the manuals, but they will get tucked away in the downstairs storage rather than burn precious shelf space. LTFM

Desktop Generations

I happened to have all of my desktop computers together and unhooked from everything, so I took a family photo.



It's an interesting progression. My first real desktop (not pictured) was actually a hand-me-down from my family. It was a custom built 486 DX. Whoa baby, was that a smokin machine. It started life with a 300 MB harddrive and was later upgraded by me to a whopping gig for $300. I think I got 300 MB worth of spam today.

Anyway, the Gateway machine served me well. It took me through the backend of college and gave me a workout when I had to move it between school and home. That thing is a metal monster. I actually set it on my toe while arranging the picture and multiple curse words came out of my mouth. I purposedly bought the biggest tower they offered because I just knew I'd want to cram all sorts of hardware upgrades in there. I've been meaning to put a drive in the Gateway and give it to someone deserving for about 3 years now. One of these days...

The Dell was even better. Enough horsepower to pull a beer wagon, wicked stealth styling, and a really crappy flap on the front that hid the worst designed USB ports of all time! I dump on it now, but it was a great computer in its day too. I recently retired that one. I have little use for XP these days at home and it was just burning electricity and contributing to clutter. Plus, it is about a year past due for an OS reinstall. I swear it has malware of some sort on it even though scans show nothing. Every five minutes a program flashes in the task bar and then disappears. I haven't let it sit on the Internet longer than a few minutes in months. The Dell also shows one of the only times I carried forward hardware. I paid a premium for that Plextor burner because it did CD-TEXT. I used to rock a 300 disc CD changer and would dupe all of my CDs with CD-TEXT for that player. Nero had a great disc copy that would add CD-TEXT. That was mucking that I enjoyed because it helped me enjoy my music.

The Grandson in this photo is the Mac mini. The mini was my switcher experiment. If you've read any of my other posts, you know the experiment was a success. I like my mini, but I purposely bought it underpowered to save cash and it just isn't up to the task of being the main computer at home. It is fabulous in the office though. It is tiny, quiet, and not fugly. Notice the lack of silly stickers and a color scheme that doesn't remind you of roller blades.

The decreasing tower size directly reflects my disdain for mucking with my computers and desire to have a computing device that has a little more style. I used to think I had to have the biggest tower because what if I wanted to drop 5 drives inside? Well, I never went past 3 drives, and I've never gone past 2 optical drives. I don't see myself needing to add on a Blu-ray burner anytime soon, so I'd like my new desktop computer to skip the tower completely!

What does your computer lineage look like?

Google RSS Enhancements

I haven't seen any mention of this feature yet. When accessing my Google personalized homepage, my regular RSS headlines were enhanced with expanders to show the content behind the links. This brings the functionality more inline with dedicated RSS feed readers.

I took a screenshot and now the feature is gone again. Here you go.

Identicons vs. Autobots

I have discussed commenting systems before. A recent flurry of work is attempting to address some of the concerns. Don Park has invented identicons. I'll let you go read about them yourself, but essentially, an identicon is a visual cue to identity. It maps an IP address to an image. The idea is to help readers identify a person's comments in a group of comments, whether because they want to read those comments, or as a simple indicator that the comments may not belong to the person they think they belong to.

The title, aside from being a childhood reference, suggests that identicons could be a way of combatting comment spam. If the comment spam was not removed completely, perhaps its identicon could be learned as one to skip past when scanning the comments. Slashdot does something similar with their Friends and Foes system and I do find it useful when deciding what to read out of hundreds of comments. I'll for sure read the friends and the enemies of the friends to get the opposing view points.

The identicon idea does have drawbacks. For one, there are already a handful of me-too implementations that, while cool, contribute to the identity problem because you will end up with different identicons in different places.

In all, it's a very interesting solution to a very complex problem and is worth some thought.

Something for Nothing

There are a couple of items in the news right now that do a good job at pointing out how whiny people really are. First up, Apple is being nice and letting certain computer owners upgrade their Wi-Fi to pre-N. They are charging $5 for this. I think this is completely reasonable. Most commenters are pitching a fit. They foam at the mouth and scream at Apple's audacity to charge for something they already have.

I think free software updates have spoiled people. Software didn't use to have free updates. You ran the version that came in the box and you liked it. As the net began draining into homes around the globe, we had an easy way to provide software updates. Combine that with the continued acceleration of the world and we ended up with more software, faster, but often with more bugs. This combo led to free updates. Some might be inclined to view it as fixing the crap that should have worked the first time. There are new features that are added for free, but should we always expect that?

So now we've moved past free software updates and people now want free hardware updates. Go ahead and argue that the upgrade to 802.11n is just software. If that's true, I know someone with a drawer full of Lucent Orinoco cards that would love for you to upgrade to 802.11n for them. Apple could have left the hardware out completely and made you take your computer in for service or ship it back for including the hardware. Instead, they provided a way to enable the feature at a cost later on. Sounds a lot like the OnStar you get in vehicles doesn't it? One guy even claimed that he was owed this upgrade because he made his purchasing decision based on the fact that Apple was including 802.11n capable hardware. He has conveniently forgotten that Apple never told him this. That was all rumor and sleuthing provided by the fan sites.

It seems this cost might be due to legal and accounting reasons. Even if it isn't, $5 isn't much. If you don't want it, don't buy it. If $5 turns you in to one of those people that rails against a company for petty stuff, well don't let the dogcow bite you on the way out.

The flip of this is Netflix's announcement that they will add streaming movie downloads for their customers. I'm a long standing Netflix customer and this is the best thing I've heard out of them since they dropped their price. For every dollar you spend, you get an hour of streaming video. That's amazing. I'm on the 3-out plan, so that would be 18 hours. We don't even watch 18 hours from the DVDs we get every month. This will help in my battle to ditch cable TV. I think this will be great for those movies that you get that are more about one fight scene or car chase. You can watch the good stuff and skip the shipping turnaround. You're also never without a movie. You can fire up your browser during netflux.

Bringing this back to the whining theme. One guy noted that Netflix is launching this as IE/XP only. He then demanded that since he couldn't run that combo, that Netflix drop his monthly subscription cost to cover the functionality he can't use. WTF? Dude, they are adding this on. You aren't paying for it today. If you don't like it, bail.

iLife Invades Life

I was watching some stand-up on Comedy Central. I was enjoying the comic quite a bit and actually caught myself reaching for the remote so I could rate the set 4 stars. Yes, I am so used to applying my likings to music and photos in iTunes and iPhoto that my brain has decided to start rating things in the rest of my life.

Just last week, I was listening to the weather while waiting in the drive-thru line at Burger King. The weatherman said today's weather would be partly cloudy with a high of . When it was my turn, I ordered a Bacon Double . On my way out of the parking lot, some jerk cut me off and I nearly got in a wreck. I rolled down my window and yelled... "Hey moron, you drive like !"

iPhone Questions

To go along with my hits and misses, I have a few iPhone questions that haven't been fully answered yet.

• Will it be locked down? - Some articles say you can't run your own apps. Some might read in to the statements with a little more hope for loading their own code on their iPhone. From the NY Times article
  

  “These are devices that need to work, and you can’t do that if you load any software on them,” he said. “That doesn’t mean there’s not going to be software to buy that you can load on them coming from us. It doesn’t mean we have to write it all, but it means it has to be more of a controlled environment.”

  
  I see hope in the Widgets. The phone appears to run the same Widgets from the desktop. I'm hoping that Dashcode isn't just for the desktop and will be the vehicle for custom development on the iPhone.


• Is the battery removable? - Most likely, not, and I'm ok with that, but I've talked to some folks that say there is no way they'd get one if it didn't have a second battery option.


• Full use Bluetooth? - Bluetooth headsets are a given. Apple is releasing their own, which is curious. Are they doing this to embed some simpler pairing or did they see an opportunity to design a nice headset. Personally, I think there are quite a few nice headsets on the market. They will have a tough time besting those already in the market. Apple has yet to post any details about their headset. I'm hoping they do that soon.
  
  Beyond headsets, what will we get? A2DP? Dial-up networking? HID? Object push? If A2DP is in there, I think I'll have to buy one, whether or not I want to use the phone portion (more on that in another question). A2DP would also allow for cleaner music sending and control without goofy solutions. Dial-up networking would sure make the data plan worth having. Apple has great Bluetooth networking support in OS X. Macbook + data enabled iPhone = high degree of connectibility. HID would shut up all of the folks that have to have plastic keys to be happy typing. I'd expect mini thumb boards and sewn-in keyboards to show up in droves. Object push would let you make use of that 4/8 GB of flash and get your pictures off without a cable. If it were Apple alone, I think all of this would work. Since this is a phone, I'm more concerned that the carriers will have a hand in blocking some of these features, as they've done in the past.


• Can you buy one without a contract? - Some folks are saying yes because they will be for sale in Apple stores. I don't think that means a darn thing. I'm pretty sure you'll be forced to buy a contract, even though the pricepoint seems to be an unsubsidized price. That's Cingular's payoff for keeping the secret, developing the back end for visual voicemail and generally relaxing their requirements to let Apple do what they want to do with a phone on their network. If the contract is required, I predict tons of cheap iPhones on eBay 2 years from June. People go through phones like bread. "Ohh, you have a RAZR? That's so stale. The KRZR is where it's at, doof!" If Apple doesn't follow on with non-phone widescreen touch iPods, then the used iPhone market is going to be jumping for those that don't care about the phone and just want the rest.


• Can you use it without a SIM? - I think it would be suicide to disable the device if it had no SIM, but who knows when you get mobile carriers involved. I guess we'll see.


• Can you send music wirelessly? - We all know the Zune can squirt, but will the iPhone? Will you be able to send non-DRM'd files over Wi-Fi or Bluetooth or is that part of the no wireless synching that I've heard? Will you be able to send DRM'd music? I can see myself dropping an album or two on a friends computer or work computer to listen with the connected speakers. You auth that machine so it can play that content and then de-auth it when you leave. That's within the bounds of the DRM, as long as you can get the files off of the phone.

Do you have any links to help answer these questions? Leave a link in the comments.

iPhone Misses

To go with the hits, I definitely think the iPhone has a few misses.

• Can't sync over wireless - Please let this be untrue. I've been begging for wireless sync for years now. Now there is Wi-Fi and Bluetooth onboard and still no wireless sync?


• Phone contract - Ugg. I don't have a mobile phone now. This might make me get one, but it still would be nice to have this device for the iPod and communicator functionality without being locked into a contract. I'd prefer it to just be sold as a GSM phone that I can take to the carrier of my choice which might be no carrier at all.


• Can't buy songs from the iTunes store - Again, I want this to be untrue. Think of the thousands of songs a day that will be bought by people at the airport, waiting for the bus, or just hanging out with friends. The impulse buy is quite powerful. Here a track at the club that you love, buy it immediately so you don't forget.


• Development age - Maybe it's just me, but some of the included tech suggests that this has been in development for 2.5 years. EDGE but not 3G could be a deal-breaker for some. Also the 2 megapixel phone seems pretty basic. Again, I don't care that there is a phone at all, but some will complain about the camera. Hopefully the camera has better optics than most mobile phone cameras.


• Different Dock - The pictures of the iPhone in a dock look like it is a different dock than the iPod. What happened to the plastic inserts? It uses an iPod dock connector, but not the dock? That sucks. I hate docks all over my desk and without the ability to wirelessly sync, they force me to have a dock or a hanging cable. Both of those choices are crappy.

Lots are calling the price a miss. I actually called for a $499 price, but that was without a contract. If I'm thinking ahead, I think Apple had to go with that price point to leave room for a $399 100 GB iPod that has widescreen and multi-touch capabilities. If the phone were any cheaper, because of a subsidy from Cingular, people wouldn't be able to get past the mental block of an iPod that costs more than the iPhone with an iPod in it, completely disregarding the 2 year contract lock-in. I think the iPhone is actually going to bring revenue to all of the wireless carriers as folks pay a penalty to break their existing contracts to go with the iPhone.

I also really don't care if it has a removeable battery or not. Many people will, but it is nice to see a 5 hour talk time which is more than many Blackberries which state a 4 hour talk time.

Next up, the questions that I still have about the iPhone.

iPhone Hits

I think Apple has another hit on their hands with the iPhone. Here are some things I think they did right.

• No buttons - I doubt many Blackberry users will switch, but that's ok. I tend to agree with Steve's explanation. Buttons are in the way when you don't need them and when you think of a good interface idea, you have no option but to build new hardware. I like the sleek, simple face. Notice that they still don't have an Apple logo on the front. That makes me happy. I'm also glad to see no number buttons, just like I asked for. If you watch the keynote, Steve refers to dialing a phone number as being "real last century"


• Multi-touch - Wow, wow, wow. We've been getting a taste of this in movies and university research, but to see it in real life use is something to celebrate. Even if the iPhone is a complete flop as a phone, this technology will certainly creep in to lots of other places.


• Focus on contacts, not phone numbers - Yup, phone numbers are stupid. Keep one set of carefully polished contacts and sync them everywhere.


• Awesome unlock - Locking and unlocking phones until know have been a huge pain in the butt. This looks like a perfect solution.


• Dedicated ring/silent switch - Useful


• Flick to scroll - Looks amazing


• Call merging and adding - Yes, yes. Why is this still hard? I have no idea how to operate these functions on my work phone. I use them rarely, but I would like to use them at times if I knew how.


• Visual voicemail - Email inbox style voicemail. Everyone's thought of it. Now we have it.


• iPod dock connector - Reuse existing cables and possibly add-ons.


• Size - Looks like a good form factor. I can't wait to hold one.


• Wi-Fi and Bluetooth - These are must have technologies. I'm hoping for wide Bluetooth profile support.


• Google Maps - Location services are hot. I refuse to ask for directions, so this is great!

Notice I didn't say anything about the camera or texting. I think those will be marginally acceptable. I don't really like cameras in phones in the first place.

Next up, the misses and the questions.

Throw Hardware At It

When I saw the product announcement of the Popalive Remote & and Dock, I had to groan. This product is the wrong answer. The question is, How can I get songs from my iPod to play on my stereo and control the iPod simply from across the room.

I have to give Alive Style credit for trying to replicate the iPod's ease of use on the remote side. Unfortunately, it looks like they borrowed more of the style than of the substance. It looks like it has a scroll wheel, but it doesn't. It looks like the familiar iPod screen interface, but it isn't. It even adds buttons. I know most remotes have more buttons than the thing they control, but why? We're at a point where the interface can be on screen. We don't need more buttons on the remote, we need less.

I think the most depressing thing about this product category is using a thing like-an-iPod to control an iPod sitting near a stereo with even more wires. They've just tossed a bunch of hardware at the problem rather than solving it. To me, solving it is using the darn iPod as the controller. No need to learn a new interface. No need to charge an additional item. No need to drop another dock on the table with yet another wire. Have the iPod send the audio wirelessly to the stereo. I've posted at least half a dozen times about A2DP in an iPod. Here's hoping we see that tomorrow at Macworld. I'm not holding my breath. A2DP is showing up in players. Apple is getting their butt kicked on that one.

2006 Albums of the Year

Usually these sorts of lists get put out in late December. I guess I'm a little behind.

With the growing presence of online music, the album may be fading. I still like albums and have special respect for those artists that can put together a cohesive, quality, collection of music. I expand the definition of album just a little. I include DJ mixes as albums.

I started putting this list together with no set number of how many I wanted to list. As I began to whittle it down, I found these six to be the best of the best for 2006. So, in no particular order (err, alphabetical)...

• BT - This Binary Universe
  I think BT is a tremendous artist. It's nice that he took a little break from movie scoring to make this. I guess you could say this is still a movie score, except the movie is his life. This one will stand the test of time.


• DJ Shadow - The Outsider
  As usual, the albums that bug me at first become beloved over time. I guess I can't immediately appreciate the new directions. I'd still prefer to hear more stuff like Endtroducing, but I liked this enough to make my best of 2006.


• Evil Nine - Fabriclive.28
  Bumpin' mix. I wouldn't expect any less. Fabriclive is putting out great stuff.


• Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere
  Easily my most played album of the year. This disc has yet to leave the 6 disc changer in my truck. I show no signs of tiring of it. This is how albums should be done. Each track is unique, but yet it feels whole.


• The Remote - Hard to Miss
  Global Underground has done a great job with their artist albums. The Remote is at the top of the stack.


• Stanton Warriors - The Stanton Sessions, Vol. 2
  Like Gnarls Barkley, this has seen heavy play on the roads. The artist tracks are my favorite, but the included DJ mix is a burner too.

2 Way iPod

By accident, I found that you can listen to your iPod using both the headphone jack and the dock connector. Many (most?) functionality that uses the dock port takes over the iPod. A Bluetooth dongle is one accessory that doesn't. I found I can listen to my Bluetooth headphones and it doesn't stop the output to the headphone jack.

You may not care in the slightest, but I do see some applications for this 2 way action. You can jack in to your friends iPod without disturbing them too much. This would be good for side by side machines at the gym, or road trips (think back of the van and front), or even listening to your cubicle neighbor's iPod, just for something different. The wireless aspect allows much more freedom than a traditional headphone splitter.

You can also use this method to hear the latency of the A2DP connection. It isn't much, and perfectly acceptable for most listening applications, but you can clearly hear why you won't be using Bluetooth headphones for DJing any time soon.

100 Days of Cycling

You may remember my post from earlier this year where I set a goal to ride my bicycle 100 days this year. I'm pleased to say, I have met this goal. Yesterday was my 100th ride.

I wasn't sure if I'd meet my goal. Late in August, I was barely past the halfway mark. I figured it would be pretty hard to find the days in the fall and winter. Turns out, I was right. It was hard to find days. That made me switch to nights :) I haven't really done much night riding, but I enjoy it quite a bit now. As long as you have a good light and a safe route, it can be a very calming experience. At least 30 of my rides were done at night. The number of cars I would encounter dropped to 1/10th and the number of police cars I saw at least tripled.

I would never have been able to meet this goal without an understanding wife, and some good equipment. These items were key:

• A durable bike - At least 50% of my rides were done on my Specialized Langster. I love the bike. It's a single speed, so there's less to maintain, less to break, and less to clean. I managed to make it through the year with only one flat on the Langster. Other than that, I just cleaned and lubed it every now and then.


• A good light - You want to see and be seen when riding at dusk or dark. I've mentioned it before. My Light and Motion Vega is a great light. It stood up to the cold and rain.


• A skull cap - It has been warmer than normal this year, but I did have a few rides below freezing. Covering your head and ears is essential. I picked mine up for $5 at a bike tradeshow.


• Cold weather pants - Plenty of bike riders have no need for pants. When it gets too cold for the shorts, they just hang it up for the year. I'd be really fat if I did that. They weren't cheap, but I got a nice pair from Cannondale with Windstopper fronts. These things are glorious. Warmth is never a problem. I use them for biking, skiing, snow shoeing, and hiking.

This year's goal was not miles, it was days. Next year's goal is back to miles, but with a twist. Stay tuned.

Stupid Internet People

A fun clip from Judge Judy. It sounds pretty bad when taken out of context. It's no secret that Judge Judy doesn't much care for computers, but she was actually ranting about the stupid things people do with each other after only knowing them for a short period of Internet contact only.

I don't get WMP

Maybe it's all of that Apple kool-aid that I drink, but I just don't get Windows Media Player. I don't understand the design. I don't understand where I need to click. I don't understand why it has so many different viewing modes. I don't understand why it can't handle it's own invisible border properly when you drag it around. I don't understand the handling of the timers.

I like to see the timer display time left on the track. Most players represent that with a negative sign. -00:09 tells you that the track will be up in 9 seconds. Windows Media Player doesn't use the negative. The difference between counting up and counting down is...well there is no difference. You have to watch the counter long enough to figure out which way it is counting to know what mode you last left it in. Maybe not a problem to you, but I don't use it alot, and it's a problem to me.



While I'm clicking around trying to figure out the counters, I see something quite odd. The timer disappears and relocates to the title-bar, well the fake title-bar anyway. They show the time in a completely different way up there. More choices have to be better, right?



To recap, WMP starts by counting down. Click it and it will count up. Click it again and it will jump to the fake title-bar and count up. It seems you can't get it to count down in the fake title-bar. Less choices have to be better, right?

The real craziness is the poor little shuffle icon that gets sucked up in the mess. When the counters are down low, you get an icon to control the shuffle modes. When the counter jumps up top, the shuffle mode icon goes on break! It doesn't jump to the top. It just diappears completely! Now you have a blank area that could still have the icon, but it doesn't. No choice has to be better, right? (yes, you can still get to it in the menu...if you can figure out how to pop a menu)

Finally, just to make you slap your head one more time...if you "Show Menu Bar", you'll get a real title-bar. If you go do your click dance on the counters now, the counter and shuffle icon will disappear completely. It doesn't pop to the title-bar. It disappears and you can't get it back until you switch to fake title-bar mode and click. I seriously can not find a menu or right click way to get it back. You have to switch modes and click.

Can anyone justify this behavior? What use case am I missing?