My Dads SGI	2010-02-17 -P
Here is a short story about my dad and the SGI machine I gave him to browse the web with. I hope you like it. :) Dads SGI -C
	Personal Philosophy	2010-01-19 -P
There are few things in life as emotionally moving as when one realizes just how small and precious humankind really is. From our viewpoint we look upon ourselves as the masters of our little corner of the universe (earth). When it comes right down to it, we are so vanishingly small in relation to the cosmic arena as to virtual not exist. Yet here we are. Here we are to ponder such things. Here we are to witness the universe in all its glory for the short time we have been here. Anyone who claims to know anything about the origins of the universe is as foolish as the ant on the sidewalk, claiming to his little ant friends, how he knows the origin of the sidewalk and has a personal relationship with its creator. To realize our fallacies for what they are, is to bring oneself one step closer to truth. -P
	5.9L Cummins TPS Sensors, etc	2009-07-17 -P
A couple years back, I bought myself a new(to me) truck. I had wanted a 4x4 for years since I live in the country and both of my parents have very poor health. Ya never know when ya need to make a trip to the ER at 3AM at -40C with 3 feet of snow on the ground(literally). I also decided to get a one ton with duals and I had owned a diesel before and really liked it so I wanted a diesel also. Since I also haul coal to heat my home(s) with, I also needed a fairly heavy duty truck, preferably a one ton. Before I actually started looking for a truck, I spent the better part of a year researching what models had what problems, what were easy fixes, what to stay away from, etc. Since the motor is the most expensive part of a vehicle, thats where I spent most of my time researching. It turned out that there are really only two models of engine in the age range I was looking for that were reliable. These were the 7.3L ford diesel and and 5.9 cummins turbo diesel. The 5.9 is an inline 6 unit just like in big highway rigs and in fact, I managed to look under the hood of my neighbours kenworth that has a cummins in it. I swear you could swap motors with no issues at all! It looks nearly identical to the 5.9 cummins in every respect thats in the dodge trucks. At this point I started looking for a truck. Either the 7.3 or the 5.0 would do though I had a preference for the 5.9L. Fortune was about to smile on me. I got a REALLY(like, stupidly good) good deal(thanks Tim and James) on a 94 4x4 one ton 3500 dodge dually with a 5.9 cummins in it. This truck is huge and freaking awesome. It has limited slip axles all around, shift on the fly 4wd, an auto transmission(meh, it's not SO bad), dual wheels in the back, the 5.9 cummins turbo diesel and every other goodie I could have wanted in a big truck. I would definitely recommend this unit to ANYONE who needs a good truck. The truck drives well and gets incredible mileage(in the 20's even with the auto) and has more power than I would ever need. It has more than enough power to turn all 4 back wheels into a cloud of smoke nearly instantly. Amazing. As always though, there were some issues with it when I bought it used and I will share the issues and fixes below. Torque converter lock/unlock over and over on the highway issues. The first issue that popped up was the transmission. The auto in this particular truck has a lock up torque converter. When on the highway at certain throttle settings, the torque converter would lock and unlock again over and over every second or so with an accompanying slight increase and decrease in speed. It was highly annoying. It turned out to be the TPS sensor(Throttle Position Sensor). This sensor is simply a potentiometer that measures the position of the throttle so it can determine when to lock and unlock the torque converter. When these get old, just like an old radio volume control, they get noisy. This noise confuses the control circuit and therefore causes this issue. I thought I would just replace the darn thing and get it over with but a quick trip to the parts store made me think otherwise. They wanted close to 300 dollars for a potentiometer!!! Needless to say I did NOT buy it. Instead, I made a little filter circuit that eliminates the issue altogether. This filter is literally nothing but a ~5uF capacitor between ground and the output. This filter the output into a nice smooth signal just as if the sensor was new. Now no matter HOW noisy this gets, it will never fail to work properly again. Issue fixed PERMANENTLY. Wandering steering all over the road. Another thing that was bothering me was the steering in the truck. Before I got my hands on it the guy previous had about $6000 bucks worth of new parts put into the front end. The entire front end is tight as a baby racoons behind yet it STILL wandered all over the road. I got my wife to wiggle the steering while I layed under it to see where the slop was coming from. It ended up all coming from the steering box output shaft. There was close to 1/2" of slop at the end of this shaft which would explain the horrible wandering. These steering boxes have an adjustement for wear and I took the time and set mine as close as I could get it to perfect without having any binding at all whatsoever. This truck now drives like its on rails. Literally. The steering now feels as tight as it does on our brand new toyota camry. There literally isnt ANY slop at all that can be sensed. Problem solved. Crappy headlights. The stock headlights are terrible. I put on some extra aftermarket low beams that keep nearly 100% of the light on the road and then bought some HID units for high beam extras and made custom reflectors for them. I now have as much light on the road at 1000 yards as I did at 100 before. Problem cured. There are still a few nagging issues here and there like rust, etc, but this is to be expected with a truck over 10 years old. It will be getting a couple coats of chassis saver and then I will never need to worry about rust again. -P
	Personal DALnet issues	2009-05-26 -P
Oh dalnet, what has become of you. You used to be a place I could talk with friends without worry. Now, you seem to give me nothing but grief. About 3 years ago, I finally got a decently fast last mile connection to my home. We got wireless service from Syban. Right away they got bought out by Ralcomm which was pretty neat actually since I used to work there and I am good friends with all of the people there. At this point things were still working normally. Then Ralcomm wireless customers were bought out by xplornet. When I first found out we were now dealing with a large company I was rather upset. My past history dealing with large corporations has been less than satisfactory and was expecting more of the same with xplornet. Having been with them for a number of years now, I must say that I am REALLY happy with thier level of service and thier customer relations seem to be excellent also (so far). They have even been reasonable enough to let me download large backups from other computers and such as long as *I* am reasonable and do it late at night, etc. I would personally rate them as a 9/10 as far as large ISP's go, maybe even leaning towards 10/10. Dalnet however seems to take issue with me connecting as an xplornet user. I say this only because not a single one of my friends with OTHER isp's have ever had the kline issues that I seem to have every other month or so. At first, I was only getting klined when I would fire up my shop computer and try and chat with friends while my main machine and my girlfriend were online (a total of 3 concurrent connections). Now, I can't seem to connect even me and her at the same time. I had been on IRC for close to two weeks without issue. The instant my girlfriend tried to join dalnet to talk to me online we BOTH got klined (well, our IP got klined). I personally feel that they should bump the max users per IP up to around 5 or 6 users. When I have friends over, they like to use IRC sometimes too and we can have 4 to 6 users at once easily. The reason they all appear to be from the same IP is because of something called NAT (Network Address Translation). Since it isnt practical OR desirable to give every computer its own public IP, NAT is a stopgap solution for this problem. So, is are the issues specific to xplornet users? Is it just an issue with the number of concurrent users per IP? Since I dont work for dalnet its pretty hard to find out for sure but one thing for certain, if its a hard limit set with the servers themselves, the for SURE should up the number of concurrent users allowed per IP. By setting this level arbitrarily low, they will/are harm thier own userbase. Having said all that, I would like to say thank you to all the people that have made dalnet what it is over the years. You have made the world a better place for many people and I thank you for all your hard work and dedication. :) -P
	How to take care of 12V lead acid batteries	2009-05-16 -P
Here is a quick tutorial on how to charge and care for lead acid 12V batteries. scenario #1 (dead battery) First, check the electrolyte and if it is low, add distilled water JUST to the top of the plates. Charge the battery until the voltage rises to 14.4 volts and let it float at that voltage (or even a bit higher)for a few hours but no longer. Once the pack is charged, add distilled water to bring the electrolyte level up to normal. Once a month, charge the pack back to 14.4V or slightly higher for a few hours to keep the battery in peak condition. This should be done to ANY battery that is in storage or float use. If the pack is to floated continuously, float it at ~13.2V if you can still schedule a once monthly peaking charge to the ~14.4V. If you can NOT get to the battery to do a float charge once a month or so (very remote areas, etc) you can set the charge voltage to ~13.4V for warm weather, ~13.6V for cool weather or ~13.8V for cold weather. In summary: check electrolyte, bulk charge to 14.4V and float at 14.4V+ for a few hours, top up electrolyte and store. Once a month charge to ~14.4V for an hour or two as an equalizing charge and check electrolyte. If in float service (UPS, etc) set voltage to the following values and temperature ranges: warm weather=~13.4V, cool weather=~13.6V, cold weather=~13.8V. If a pack is to be stored for any length of time, make sure to fully charge it and make sure the electrolyte level is proper. Make sure to use a 14.4V+ peaking charge prior to storage and then once a month charge for a few hours. Also of interest, most DUMB chargers (the majority of automotive type chargers on the market) will charge to slightly over 14.4V from a normal mains voltage. This is a good type of charger to use for the once a month peaking. Just make sure the voltage has come up to 14.4 BEFORE you start timing for the hour or two peaking charge. -P
	How to take care of batteries	2009-03-06 -P
Batteries: the source of energy for your magick box of choice. Without batteries, many of our modern devices we depend on simply cease to function. As such, it is important to take care of the batteries in our devices and equipment. Doing so will greatly increase thier life expectancy. As a wise man once said, most batteries do not die of natural causes, they are murdered. TYPES OF BATTERIES Generally speaking, there are three main types of rechargeable batteries in modern devices. These types are Nickel Cadmium(nicad), Nickel Metal Hydride(nimh) and Lithium Ion(li-ion). Each type of battery has strengths and weaknesses and each requires different types of care. NICADS(nickel cadmium) are the one of the oldest types of batteries still in common use. They offer mediocre power density but are able to deliver HUGE quantities of current on demand. This makes them useful in devices that have high peak power demands but dont require it for long periods of time such as camera flashes, etc. The best way to charge these types of cells is with a smart charger or by doing a slow charge of the rate of 1/10 the total capacity for about 12 hours or so. Do not leave these types of batteries on the charger for more than 24 hours unless it is a smart charger. The advantages of this battery type is its huge peak current abilites. The drawbacks of the type is that its overall power capacity is relatively low, the contents of the battery are very toxic and it exibits what is called the memory effect. The memory effect is best avoided by totally discharging the cells before recharging. NIMH(nickel metal hydride) is a more modern battery type and has seen wide adoption for a variety of devices, especially ones where they use the AAA, AA, C and D types. These batteries offer relatively good capacity, arent anywhere near as toxic as nicads and have a similar voltage profile as nicads. This allows them to be used in devices originally using nicads. The peak current is not quite as good as nicads but is still substantial. Nimh also does not show any of the memory effects like nicad does. Again, these types of batteries are best charged at 1/10C for 12 hours or even better, charged with a smart charger. The only real drawback of nimh is that they do not tolerate overcharging as well as nicads. Generally speaking, NIMH is the safest battery chemistry for consumer use. The contents is not nearly as toxic as nicads or li-ion and they are very difficult to destroy. Li-Ion(Lithium Ion) is currently the champ in overall power capacity and ease of charge. These cells are very low weight and have a relatively high voltage per cell(~3.6V). Charging these cells is as easy as applying a 4.0V-4.2V voltage across thier terminals limiting peak current to about 1C. The charge voltage range is due to the fact that the cell WILL exhibit a higher overall capacity(~10%-20%) if charged to the higher voltage range but the lifetime of the cell will be substantially shorter. In many ways, the lithium ion battery is the ideal battery for many applications, especially where weight and capacity are of concern. This idealism comes at a price however and this price is MUCH higher danger in certain types of failure. Although it rarely happens, lithium ion and the newer lithium ion polymer batteries have been known to spontaneously catch fire or explode. Making things even worse, it is nearly impossible to put the fire out and it tends to just run its course and once all the flammable internal material is used up, extinguish itself. The conditions that usually lead to this type of failure are high charge voltages and very high temperatures. If you keep the charge voltage limited to 4.10V and 1C peak current AND keep the cells below 25C, they are very safe and offer very high capacity with low weight and no memory effect. Also of interest is that these types prefer to be charged often and only discharged as shallow as possible between charges. Long term storage of this type is not recommended as they are subject to internal aging effects, however, if required it is adviseable to only charge the cells to ~40% of thier capacity and store in a cool dry place(0C or cooler). This will limit the aging effects and allow a reasonable storage lifetime. When the battery is placed back in service, simply charge it back to its peak and put it back into use. -P
	Digital Camera Obsolescence	2009-02-28 -P
I've been reading some digital photography blogs on the internet again recently. One opinion I have come across regarding the longevity of digital cameras is that they tend to become "obsolete" just like computers do. This is one thing I definitely do NOT agree with and there are a few reasons for this. Reason number one is that unlike a general purpose computer, a camera is made for one purpose and the software that drives the hardware does not change (other than firmware updates). This means that in 5 years, my D70 will STILL turn operate exactly the same as it did the day I bought it. It won't need a CPU upgrade and I won't need to update the graphics or hard disk either. It is a single purpose machine built for a specific job and that job is to take photographs. Other examples of single purpose digital machines would be microwaves and fuel injection in vehicles. Does your microwave need to be replaced because of food 2.0? Do you need to replace the fuel injection computer in your vehicle because the new gasoline makes it unusable? Reason number two has to do with perceived obsolescence. My D70 makes around an 8x10 print at 300DPI print resolution. Do prints shrink with time? Is the 8x10 I made years ago somehow only a 4x5 print now? Of course not. Print size is print size. Period. A good quality DSLR camera will last you for many years in the same fashion that a 35mm SLR did. The only difference being that it's digital instead of film. Some serious photographers cry foul about the quality of digital, but again, the bottom line is, the print quality you have now will be the same in the future. Just because ANOTHER camera came out with better specs does NOT mean the one you have now doesn't do the same job it did when new. -P
	Deep Cycle batteries	2009-02-09 -P
What is the best deep cycle battery? First, we need to define what best means. To me, best usually refers to something that does the job well and does it the longest. When it comes to RV batteries deep cycle is the only way to go. Using a normal starting battery in deep cycle use will kill the poor thing in short order. If you even got a month from a normal starting battery in deep cycle use using it every day, I would be surprised. A battery made specifically for deep cycle use is much better. The issue I had was that even common brand deep cycles typically only lasted roughly two years, with one good solid year of perfomance followed by another year of o-k performance and then dropping off rapidly after that. At roughly 120 bucks a pop in this area, it tends to get expensive in the long run to always have good batteries in the RV. After about ten years of dealing with common brand deep cycles I decided there must be a better made battery and started my search. I ended up buying two trojan brand T-105's. These batteries are 6V and 225 amp/hour capacity. Two of them in series makes a 12 volt pack of 225A/H. These batteries are just a brute of a battery. They are much heavier than any other deep cycle I have ever owned just simply due to the amount of active materials they put into these things. I have had these two batteries for around ten years now and they are STILL going strong. I wouldnt have believed it if I hadnt seen it with my own eyes. These batteries have been run completely flat more than once, been in hot conditions, outside in our -40 winters and so on and to this day, I cant perceive any loss in capacity. For sure there will be a loss of some sort but it just isnt perceivable and thats the important thing. Nothing is worse than having your batteries go flat in the middle of the night and then not having any lights or furnace, etc. The long and the short of it? If you want a good RV battery, buy Trojan. They might be a bit more money, but they will save you piles of money in the long run and you wont be shivering in the middle of the night anymore. There is one important thing to know about trojans however. The ones I have seem to gas more during charge than some other types I have had. If I had to do it over again, I would buy hydro caps which recombine the gasses back into water and vastly reduce the amount of top up water needed. Also of note: ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS use distilled water in your batteries. If you use tap water, the minerals in it can destroy the battery. It might not be immediate, but using tap water will greatly reduce the life of a battery. -P
	How to become rich	2009-01-16 -P
Most normal people dream of being rich and not having a financial care in the world. Few ever achieve this unfourtunately and in this day and age it is the norm to have money problems. Over the years many of my friends have noticed I always seem to have shatloads of money when others are completely broke. Many of these people have asked me for advice and since I like to help people, I thought I would share some of my techniques with you here. Follow these guidelines and you will forever cease to have money problems. First off, some general ideas about finances and life. #1: There is NO amount of income you can not outspend. This is an important thing to realize right from the start. Whether you pick bottles from the ditches by roads to collect deposit money or are a CEO at a large multinational making 10 mil a year, you can easily outspend any given level of income. A common mistake people make is that when they get a better paying job or more income, they simply increase thier spending to match. New clothes, new car, new home, new whatever. They feel that now they have the money, they can afford the luxuries in life. Like they say, take care of your pennies and your dollars look after themselves. #2: Money can not buy happiness but a lack of it sure can cause unhappiness. While you can not buy a nice family and friends and money surely can not buy love, not being able to pay your bills for the basics of life like food and shelter will always make a person unhappy. After all, who enjoys being evicted or starving? Always make sure you have enough buffer in your finances to be able to take care of these things. Now, lets move on to some actual money tips. #1: Reduce your bills One of the biggest long term drains on your income is monthly bills. It seems few people ever bother to sit down and do the math, but lets calculate some rough expenditures over a persons working life for various bills. +Cell phones and digital cable/satallite can average $20/month up to $100/month or more! A single cell phone bill at $100 dollars a month is $1200 dollars a year. To put it more bluntly, over the course of an average persons lifetime, they will spend around $72,000 at $100/month. +Utilities are another big item. It is not uncommon to spend close to 300 dollars/month in a multi person household. This works out to $216,000 in a lifetime. Just by cutting your bills down to $150 a month would give you another hundred thousand dollars in your pocket. +Rent is unavoidable unless you decide to purchase a home. This is another area where a little planning can go a long way. In our area here, apartments for the same size and configuration vary in price from a low of about $500/month to about $2000/month. While it is imperative to have a safe, clean and healthy place to live, overspending here also makes long term differences. In one lifetime an apartment at $500/month equates to about $360,000. Spending $2000/month on the other hand will make that about $1,440,000. Renting the $500 vs the $2000 apartment will save you just slightly over a million dollars in your lifetime. Having a vehicle for mobility is a real need for some. Many people will opt for buying a new vehicle every 5 years or so to be sure to have the best and newest available. Assuming a price of $30,000 for a decent vehicle will result in spending about $6000 a year or, ~$360,000 in a lifetime. Consider purchasing a two or three year old vehicle instead. Generally speaking, they have lost about 50% or more of thier original value but are still barely broken in and in some cases still have a transferable warranty. This could save you ~$180,000 in a lifetime. #2: Nickels and dimes Nickel and dime items is what I like to call the small, less than one hundred dollars each items that we all purchase from time to time. Things like gourmet coffee, DVD's, CD's, candy bars, soft drinks, electronic toys, etc. Nickel and dime items are the most insidious of all expenditures for one simple reason: they seem harmless. Just like how a single ant does not pose much threat to a person. An entire colony of ants however is a powerful force to be reconed with and so it is with nickel and dime items. In this age of cheap consumer goods and big incomes, people do not even think twice about buying a dvd or a beverage, etc, but they would if they ever sat down to calculate what its costing them. Lets take the example of a coffee and donut every morning before work (5 day work week). In this area this would cost you about $4 per day. Seems pretty harmless however, in the long term, this works out to $80/month or $4800/lifetime. The same goes for alcohol and cigarretes. Some people have the habit of always going out after work to socialize for a while before heading home for the evening. Many of these people also smoke. 3 drinks and a pack of smokes each day works out to ~$750/month or ~$540,000/lifetime. Two extremes Let us do a couple of example comparisons between someone who watches thier finances vs someone who just spends without regard. The stories are entirely fictitious. Bob Spendalot Bob Spendalot is a CNC machinist at a well paying company. He is well trained in his field and is a hard worker who makes over $100,000 a year. He has a nice home that he bought on mortgage and 2 new vehicles in his garage that he is making payments on. He and his wife go out for dinner every night and both he and his wife smoke and drink. Because of all his belongings, his insurance is rather high ($250/month) and his home is expensive to heat and cool. His electronics consume lots of power ($200/month) and he and his wife enjoy impulse shopping for books, movies, candy and stuff for thier hobbies. Bob also has the nasty habit of running up his credit cards and then only paying the minimum he can on them since he does not have the money to spare to pay them all off in full to get rid of the interest payments he is making. Despite this large income, Bob is always astounded at how he never has any money. Here is a breakdown of his expenditures +Basic Needs =========== Mortgage $1000/month Power $200/month gas 50/month water 50/month cable tv $40/month cell phones $200/month eating out $600/month at $30/meal vehicle payments @$500/each/month or $1000/month --------------------------------- Total expenditure/month $3140 +Nickels and Dimes =============== 4 movies/month $100/month 120 candy bars/month @ $4/day 2 each and $120 120 soda's @ 4/day 2 each and $120 2 video games/month at $100 video game consoles amortized @ $8/month upgrade every 2 years 2 coffee and 2 donut each day $150/month various other goodies for the household, etc. $300/month smoking drinking $600/month $30/day ----------------------------------- Total expenditure/month $1498 When Bob finally did the math and tallied up his spending, he quickly realized why he always broke. He was spending $4638.00 month and did not really have anything to show for it. Before taxes Bob is making $8300/month or about $5000/month after taxes. It is a good thing his job pays well. Cindy Thrift Cindy is a single mom who is working a full time job as lower management in a department store. She makes about $2200/month after taxes. She does not smoke or drink and is frugal about her spending. She rarely eats out and instead cooks most of her meals at home and takes a lunch to work. She buys a used/new-to-her every 5 years that has less than 50,000km on it. She has worked hard to find a rental suite at only $400/month and tries to not buy impulse and nickel and dime items when possible. She buys pay as you go phone cards for her cellphone and uses it as little as possible. She has a friend do most of the work on her vehicles to save some money. +Basic Needs =========== Rent $400/month Power $40/month gas none/month, included in rent water none/month, included in rent cable tv none/month, she watches over the air broadcasts cell phones $20/month eating out $120/month at $30/meal once every friday vehicle payments $166/each/month, buys a lightly used $10K car every 5 years. --------------------------------- Total expenditure/month $746 +Nickels and Dimes =============== 2 movies/month $50/month 0 candy bars/month @ $0/day 0 soda's 0/month @ $0/day 1 video games/month at $50 video game consoles amortized @ $8/month upgrade every 2 years 2 coffee each day from work $0/month various other goodies for the household, etc. $200/month smoking drinking none/month ----------------------------------- Total expenditure/month $308 Bob makes $5000/month and spends $4638. He has +$362 left over/month. This is quickly gobbled up by unforseen life stuff and interest on credit cards. Cindy makes $2200/month and spends $1054. She has +$1146 left over/month. Because she lives a leaner lifestyle, unforseen stuff is not that expensive and she never borrows money, she does not need to. She can rely on herself alone and has a HUGE amount of money left over for a rainy day or a nice treat for herself. As you can see, a little bit of planning goes an aweful long way towards your financial goals. Once you have your finances under control you will also notice another unexpected side effect. Since you will always have money in the back, #1, you are not paying interest to anyone else and actually get to keep your money as yours. #2, because of the huge pile of money you will accumulate you will be able to take advantage of good deals as they come along. An example would be a vehicle for sale for about one half of its normal value because someone needs to liquidate it quick to pay off a debt of thier own. You now do not need to go to the bank to try and get a loan, you can simply just buy the vehicle without delay. The same applies to housing and consumer goods. Money is a tool, nothing else. It is a tool used for what is called a store of value. The more tools you have available to you the better equipped you are to take on whatever life throws at you. The banks would love to have you believe that they are there to help you with these things, but again, if you do the math, they are really just robbing you and using money as a tool with which to do it. Summary To sum this all up, this is what it all boils down to. Spend less than you earn and the better you do this, the better your finances and overall happiness will be short term as well as long term. Do NOT borrow money unless its absolutely necessary. A newer vehicle is NOT a good reason to borrow and neither is buying a newer or nicer home. purchasing a first home is about the only good reason to borrow. Live well within your means and within no time flat you will discover that your MEANS are far greater than you ever imagined. For every dollar you ever spend, no matter how insignificant, ask yourself, do I REALLY need this or do I simply want it? -P
	R2H update	2009-01-16 -P
It seems that my R2H is not dead in the water as I had presumed. This tablet PC has whats called a standby switch that prevents it from being turned on. Somehow, this switch got turned off and since its in a location thats hard to notice and the fact that I have never had a machine with such a switch before, it got overlooked. The unit does in fact power up. The battery is still dead however and I can NOT seem to find a new one anywhere. I think it may end up as a permanent truck PC for music and movies. Who knows. :) -P
	SCSI vs SATA vs IDE	2009-01-16 -P
Is scsi hardware really worth the money? It turns out that quite a few of the older, smaller 15K U320 SCSI disks have become dirt cheap in the last few years. I have seen brand new 18 gig 15K U320 units going for as little as 40 dollars in a few places and they can be had on ebay or the likes for similar outlays of cash. Good quality controllers are still ungodly expensive, but thats the way it goes. Since I do lots of photoshop work on HUGE images (most are close to 1000 megapixels and some are even as large as 3 to 4 megapixels) I bought a small scsi system with 15K disks and a PCI-E controller. To show just HOW much faster this setup is than normal consumer disks, I did a test on an image that causes the machine to page quite heavily to the scratch disks and here are the results for this operation using three different scratch disk setups. The first is a fast, consumer grade 7200 RPM disk, the second is a 10K raptor sata disk and the last is the 15K scsi array. 7200 RPM IDE disk: 1974.9 seconds 10,000 RPM Raptor: 481.5 seconds 15,000 RPM SCSI: 128.7 seconds Most hardcore PC people will recognise the raptor disk. It is widely considered to be the fastest hard disk commonly available and it truly is a screamer compared to a normal IDE disk however... As you can see from the test results, the consumer disks just simply can't compete with the scsi drives. The 15K disks are in a class of thier own. The overall experience working within photoshop using the scsi disks as scratch space is truly a joy to behold. Even more amazing is the fact that the SCSI controller was a bare bones cheapie PCI-E unit that does not do any fancy things like raid, etc. All this was handled by the OS(winXP). IDE and SATA, you may have come a long way over the years, but you still have a long ways to go to even come close to the performance of enterprise class hardware. -P
	Asus R2H reliability	2008-12-04 -P
So, I bought an R2H UMPC a while back. I wanted to use it for dumping photos in the field from my nikon D70 and D200. I really like the unit overall. Unfourtunately, I never got a chance to use it in the field as the battery failed within a month of buying the unit. I tried to order a battery from the place that I bought the unit from but they cant seem to find one for it despite the fact that its nearly brand new AND to top that all off, the damn thing has quit all together now. Completely dead. Even with just the adapter hooked up the unit has no power at all and if I put the old dead battery on the unit, it tries to charge. I ended up tearing the pack apart to see if I could just change the lipo cells, but heres where it gets even more interesting... The lipos were fine. The control electronics are what failed. So now I essentially have a pack of 4 lipos that cost me a grand. Not impressed in the least. Needless to say, I wont be buying asus again. At least when my crappy acer hardware breaks, they at least can fix it. In the case of the R2H, im on my own. -P
	What is up with Canada Post?	2008-09-02 -P
What in the world is up with Canada Post? It would seem as though a crown corporation by the name of Canada Post would immediately cause one to assume that the corporations sole reason for being would be the delivery of mail. It is thus aweful confusing to me as to why this company seems to be utterly incapable of performing it's sole task. Here are a few of my experiences in the last few years. *The cheque is in the mail* I had to utter those words to a company I was mailing a cheque too so many times it became its own cliche. I needed to send a cheque to a company a few provinces over in my own country. From Alberta to Quebec. Thats it! Nothing fancy. Or at least thats what I originally thought. I first sent the cheque via regular mail. A few weeks later I phoned to see if they had it to no avail. About 6 weeks later, it came back undeliverable. Well bummer! Fine, I checked with the company, indeed the address was correct and they were getting thier other mail so obviously the address isnt wrong. Must have been a clerical error. Fine, I send it again, this time express mail or whatever they call it, this payment is already 6 weeks behind by this time so I spent the money to get this done. The company phones ME a couple weeks later asking where the hell the cheque is. I told them it must still be in thier inbox or something because I indeed DID send it and I sent it express. Well, another 4 weeks or so of trying to track the damn thing down, it comes back AGAIN. You guessed it, undeliverable. Apparently someone didnt realize that mail isnt waterproof and destroyed the to: address. At this point, im getting pretty riled up over this whole thing. THIS CHEQUE HAS GOT TO GET THERE. Its not optional. At this point ive had enough, I ask for the FASTEST way to get it there period and WITH TRACKING. They claim two day priority post COURIER service is the way to go. Great, lets do it I tell them. It came to close to 20 bucks with tax to send this single slip of paper a third time. I think to myself "theres no possible WAY this can get buggered up again, it even has a tracking number". Well, three days later I phone to see if it has arrived yet and amazingly, the company I was sending it too STILL didnt have the damn thing. I phoned Canada Post with tracking number in hand. The lady tells me "Its currently OUT FOR DELIVERY". Well, it's about damn time I think to myself and we hang up and I phone back my company and let them know to expect it right quick, its out for delivery. I phone the next day to see if they have it yet. Guess what? NO PACKAGE! Phone Canada Post back AGAIN. Out for delivery they say. Over and over for about ANOTHER 6 weeks till the damn thing finally came back to me AGAIN. Four and a half months later, this company can't make this happen for ANY amount of money. Time for a change of plan. Walked into fedex, did the niceties and it was there the next morning. Literally. This isnt an isolated incident, this nonsense happens to me every time Canada Post is involved.
	Thanks.	2008-06-23 -P
As part of a series I plan on writing giving thanks to those who are deserving, I give you this little ditty. Its a little poem about my best friend. Read My Best Friend -P
	Computing For Everyone	2008-06-22 -P
A short writeup on how the average user should approach using computers. It solves many issues such as email issues, viruses and backups. Computing Approaches -P
	NASA\'s moon dust problem.	2008-05-28 -P
Im still amazed they have this "moon dust problem". I already have a basic prototype worked out in my head to help them with this problem. It's pretty simple with off the shelf parts. A few words will suffice. Cyclonic, Electrostatic, Resonant and Compressed. Anyone with a sufficiently broad background will immediately understand. :) -P
	Building Disk Subsystems	2008-04-13 -P
A technical paper I wrote about building effective disk subsystems for demanding applications. Most home users get by with a single disk, but once you move from basic web browsing, etc and into the domain of "power users", it's handy to design an optimal storage solution. The paper covers topics such as disk types, what types are useful for different types of workload, implementation, etc. Building a disk I/O subsystem.
	Centrifugal Forces Concepts	2008-01-27 -P
BASIC PHYSICS CONCEPT Im sure we have all at one time or another done the little trick of swinging a bucket full of water in a full circle over our heads to the amazement of others that the water stays in the bucket if done fast enough. It's a neat trick to be sure, but what are the relationships of distance from center and the RPM to how much outward force is exerted? The basic relationships are below(for the same mass and the same RPM: Doubling the distance from the center of the rotation only doubles the outward centrifugal force. Doubling the RPM makes the outward force increase by a factor of FOUR Looking at these relationships, it quickly becomes clear that the RPM at which something turns has a MUCH greater effect on the amount of centrifugal force than the distance from center. -P
	Heatsinks: Silver or Black? Paint?	2007-12-19 -P
When it comes to some basics of thermal design I see quite a bit of misinformation over and over on the web. I see big warnings "DONT PAINT YOUR STUFF, THE ORIGINAL SILVER IS BETTER THAN PAINTING IT BLACK" and so on. Most of this is utterly guesswork on a foundation of backyard mechanic type thinking. Heres the bottom line: when it comes to cooling things, nothing beats flat black (except forced air cooling). If a project such as a power supply has marginal cooling once its designed, a simple and easy way to make it run cooler is to give EVERYTHING inside it a coat of flat black paint and if possible, everything outside of it too. Make sure not to spray any circuit boards however as the paint may have unwanted properties such as being slightly to very conductive and may change impedances of circuits, etc. A quick primer on thermal design -------------------------------- A quick example project: A linear power supply that delivers 10 amps and needing to keep the pass transistor at 90C or less at full load and assuming ambient being no more than 30C. First calculate the temperature difference between ambient and max desired transistor temperatue, which in this case is 90C-20C=70C differential. Second, calculate the power that the transistor will dissipate in watts. Since we are regulating to 12V, we need to figure the voltage drop across the transistor from the filter caps. A reasonable unfiltered side voltage would be 15 volts, so the difference is 3 volts and its at 10 amps so the total power dissipated would be 3Vx10A=30watts. We know that the temp rise in a heatsink is calculated by multiplying the wattage times the thermal resistance in degree C per watt. From this, we can infer that our desired value for a heatsink can be calculated by the following formula: Thermal resistance=heat rise/wattage. In this case, we can calculate the size of heatsink required to keep our transistor in this power supply at 90C or less at 20C(room temp) and with the transistor dissipating 30 watts like this: thermal resistance= 70C divided by 30 watts which works out to 2.3 degrees C/watt. So there you have the basics of thermal design. Size of heatsink required in degrees celsius per watt is the difference between its desired maximum temperature divided by the amount of wattage it is meant to dissipate. From this you can infer some basic things. If you were to double the size of the heatsink, obviously its degree C/watt rating would be cut in half. It literally has half as much resistance to get rid of the heat and therefore the temp rise would also be half(essentially, it works twice as good). Drawing half of the maximum 10A, now 5A, would also cut the wattage dissipated by the pass transistor in this theoretical power supply in half. Thus we can quickly calculate the temp of this heatsink setup at 20C room temp and 5A output. Again, the unregulated side is still ~15V and the pass transistor is regulating it down to 12V so the voltage differntial is still 3V but now at only 5 amps so the power dissipated by the transistor is now only 15 watts, half as much as the maximum we thermally designed for. We calculate the new heatsink temperature differential by multiplying 15 watts with the thermal resistance of the heatsink which is 2.3 degrees C per watt. This comes out to 34.5 degrees difference. So at room temperature, the heatsink would now be 34.5 degrees hotter than the surrounding ambient temperature which works out to 54.5 degree celsius. As you can see, it is indeed quite trivial to design for thermal considerations once you know your power levels in a system. An example that many designers and engineers see on a daily basis is power supplies. The more power you draw, the hotter they get just like our math here proves. Back to thermal resistance VS temperature! ----------------------------------------- Nearly everyone knows that when you put a black colored object into direct sunlight, it gets an aweful lot hotter than say a silver or light colored object. This is intuitive and well understood, however, what is less intuitive is that dark colored objects also RADIATE heat more efficiently than light colored objects and by EXACTLY the same difference as they absorb more. This is pretty straight forward if you let it roll around in your brain for a while since we all know that energy is always conserved. If something absorbs heat well, it physically MUST also radiate heat just as well or certain physical laws would be broken. To prove this point I recently did an experiment with my thermal hotplate I designed and built for calculating heat sink specs. It is simply a roughly 2" X 4" piece of aluminum about 1/2 inch thick with a set of heavy duty resistors bonded to its backside and insulated except for the side that a heatsink goes onto for testing. In this test, I measured heat rise with 30 watts of power being applied to the hotplate. The bare hotplate with just its shiny silver side up peaked at 161 degrees celsius at an ambient temperature of 10 degrees celsius. Given a very light coat of flat black paint and allowed to reach its peak temperature again, it would only peak at 83 celsius at the exact same dissipated wattage. Some friends on IRC wanted to see what would happen if a shiny coat of white paint was applied and as expected, its peak was well over the 83C with the flat black. In fact, im not entirely sure what it would have peaked at since the paint doesnt tolerate heat as well as the flat black and started to burn off and discolor at somewhere around 110C. Voltage and current were measured repeatedly during the test and completely stable. Bottom Line ----------- The whole notion that a thin coat of flat black paint will make a silvered heatsink of any sort perform WORSE is total bunk. If a good majority of heat is transfered via radiation from a system, a flat black heatsink will always perform nearly twice as good as a silver one, the real world testing proves it. This isn't the last word on thermal design however since moving more air over a heatsink is easily the most powerful way to decrease its thermal resistance but there are drawbacks with that as well. A fan is an electromechanical device and as such is prone to failure whereas a well designed radiant cooling system is virtually unbreakable(the notion of breaking a color makes little sense). Even when I build a PC, every single part of the insides of the case all get a coat of flat black paint on them and my systems thank me for it. Even with 15K disks, they rarely get more than even warm to the touch even with low airflow over them. The neat part about everything inside a computer case being painted flat black is that as hot parts radiate heat to other cooler parts, the cooler parts begin to act as part of the cooling system by absorbing some of the heat and then transfering it to the airflow that goes through the case. The end result is that instead of some parts being really hot and some parts being room temperature, EVERYTHING is just barely warm, even things that not electrical such as side panels and drive cages. Flat black does wonders for thermal design and is cheap way to improve cooling! :) -P
	Coal/Wood Heat lifestyle	2007-10-31 -P
It's been about 5 years now that we have been heating primarily with coal and looking back on the whole experience, I wouldn't trade it for the world. Our Efel harmony III (harmony 3) multifuel cost me nearly $2500 dollars, though it has saved us the original cost plus installation many times over. Luckily, we had most of the stuff we needed for the installation including 6" ID insulated chimney. I did need to buy some extra hardware for mounting and so on, but it was less than a few hundred dollars total and I fully expect the mounting hardware to last the life of the residence. During the first few years, we went through some trials and tribulations but the long and the short of it is this... If you want to use coal/wood heat, make SURE you put the chimney STRAIGHT UP without ANY bends in it. If you follow that rule, you will keep the majority of the stove pipe/chimney inside the house. It will stay warm and draw better(nothing makes the wife crazier than a house full of smoke except seeing the propane bill.) and you won't have problems with backdrafting. Our initial chimney went out and then up the side of the house. This was a freaking nightmare! It never had a good draft, even with a good hot fire AND to boot, the horizontal piece of the pipe ended up always being full of fly ash. I decided to put it straight up after one season and I would NEVER go back. Straight up is the ONLY way to go. One thing that I noticed right away when we started burning coal was the utter lack of hot/cold spells. Even with the best one speed furnace (which ours is) it's always hotter when its running and cooler when its not. The coal stove utterly eliminated this. It feels more like fall/spring in the house because theres just no ups/downs. Another nice feature is that since we have our coal stove in our entrance way, it's always much warmer in there and when you come in from outside at -40 theres nothing like having that instant warmth. It's like getting a big warm hug from your home, and having a coal/wood stove burning really does make your house feel like a home. Now as many good things as there are about burning solid fuel for heat, there is also drawbacks. You will need to carry every single bit of fuel you burn BY HAND from outside to the inside and feed it into your appliance. This is called hand stoking and is quite literally an art. If it's done wrong, at best you will simply put out the fire or make it smoke like crazy, at worst, you will burn part of your grate (using coal that is, wood is easy once the stove is hot, just turf it in and set the air). Once you get the hang of hand firing, it is really quite enjoyable to tend the fire. I almost feel like it is a hobby of mine for 1/2 the year here in Canada. My wife hasn't quite got the hang of it yet though and when she needs to tend it, I make sure to tell her in detail what needs to be done and it *usually* turns out okay. Being that you are carrying in the fuel, you also need to carry out the residue aka ashes. Wood isn't so bad, but with coal, one firing usually means one cleaning. The better the stove design though, the less hassle it is. Our stove has a large ash tray that we simply carry outside with fire gloves and then throw them into the field. BE CAREFUL WITH HOT ASHES however. More than one house has been burned down by someone who thought the wind wouldnt blow them around. Thats why we dump ours a few hundred feet from the house and even then, we set one edge of the pan on the ground and then tip them out. You will also end up with trace amounts of fly ash on your stuff in the house. I suspect the automatic stokers would be better for this since you never really need to shake a grate, etc, but with a hand fired stove, its just a part of life. For the extra few thousand dollars a year you keep in your pocket, you could hire someone for a half hour every 2 weeks to dust and have tons left over! Sourcing your fuel is also something you need to make sure you can do on a regular basis if you want to stay away from gas/propane/electric heat. We are lucky here, we have a coal mine that is less than 2 hours away and we haul our own coal with our pickup. It is sort of a monthly ritual in the winter to get coal. If I go alone, its a great time for me to just sit back and relax, listen to some talk radio and have some alone time. If you haul your own fuel, heed my warning however. MAKE SURE you prep your vehicle before EVERY trip. Check the oil, the tires and be SURE you have a good jack, tire iron and spare and it doesnt hurt to have a 3-4 foot chunk of steel tube as a snipe to break lose those stubborn lug nuts. I ended up stuck in the bush for nearly 8 hours once because my spare had 15 pounds to little air in it. Remember, you are hauling a pretty hefty load, 40PSI in the tires doesnt hurt and if the tires will handle it, a tad more is probably better. Because of that experience, heres what *I* now carry: A good tire iron and 4 foot snipe for it, a good hydralic floor jack, a good spare tire and a good portable air compressor. If you haul your own and don't take this advice.... well, I told you so. :) Cost Comparison: Propane (with delivery) costs us around $800 dollars CAD/tank when its nearly empty (~10% remaining). This contains about the same BTU as a ton of the best local grade of coal. Coal (including delivery) costs us about $60 dollars CAD/ton. So as you can see, it's pretty much a no brainer when it comes to weighing the cost of the fuel as the primary reason to choose one or the other. If you are considering trying out wood or coal heat, definitely give it a try, but make sure you plan things out well. I literally spent nearly a full year tinkering/planning/thinking/working out all the issues till we arrived at our particular methods we use today. We are also pocketing about $4000 dollars a year because of our initial hard work. Four grand might not seem like much, but in 40 years, thats $160,000. In other words, you could buy a new vehicle every 5 years for the rest of your life just by heating with a different fuel. And besides, I like having that home fire burning. Theres no feeling like coming home to a nice warm cozy place with a couple cats curled up by the fire. It really does remind you why you bothered at all. :) -P
	Halo 3 to blame for poor ticket sales?	2007-10-16 -P
According to an article at http://news.filefront.com/film-execs-blame-halo-3-for-poor-movie-ticket-sales/ ,ticket sales at the box office since the release of halo 3 have been very poor. Apparently people would rather stay at home and play a great game than go and see the latest and greatest movies. To quote this page, “The audience on this game is the 18-to-34 demographic, similar to what you’d see in cinemas,” said Mike Hickey, an analyst at Janco Partners, a Denver research firm, adding that “this could last for several weeks.”. I call B.S. Everyone knows that EVERYONE wants to see every great movie that comes out and if they aren't paying for it at the box office, they are getting it somewhere else, and that somewhere else is piracy. What else is there to do with your time these days? To say that people don't want to watch these modern day works of art is utter nonsense. Anyway, enough sarcasm. Listen carefully music and movie industry people. This is a sign of things to come. Get with the times and do it fast, because no matter if you choose to or not, the future is GOING to happen and it's going to happen with or without you. Even as it is, your products are last century as they say. The future is interaction and that means you are SOL. Trying to wield your legal swords of justice on your customers will only serve to make your eventual exit much less graceful as you simply will 'sco' away. (if that last quote is lost on you, you should spend some google time looking up stuff about the company sco. It's truly worth the time, It's very entertaining.) -P
	Beliefs for the modern age.	2007-09-04 -P
Religion: that thing that's supposed to teach us moral values. The problem? Modern religions are quickly becoming a thing of the past in many parts of the world. Few people believe the world is flat anymore, fewer yet believe in the old greek gods and as more people become highly educated, they are learning that asking a question and getting a reasonable answer with proof is how progress is made. This cycle unfourtunately has led to many people once again searching for themselves and for answers. Answers on what is right and wrong, how to govern themselves, how to govern others and so on. I myself have though on these issues for ages and I have come up with what I feel is the best set of rules anyone could follow. They are as follows #1: Be honest #2: Be faithful #3: Be kind to others #4: Be reasonable #5: Accept the consequences of your actions Seems pretty simple huh? It is. Unfourtunately, many will want to complicate this which is entirely unneccesary. Here are some examples of these rules in practice. scenario #1: Your wife asks you if she looks good in those pants. If people would point and laugh, you should probably be honest, but in a kind way. Explain that you feel that something else might look better. Don't point and laugh, don't call her fat and so on. scenario #2: You feel kind of crappy one morning and with the stress at work plus stuff going on in your own life, you decide to take a sick day. The next day, your boss calls you on it and asks how come you don't really look sick. This one is kind of sticky, you don't want to lie to him, but at the same time, you don't want to give him a reason to let you go. This is a great way to employ more than one rule. You could simply explain to him that you really did feel crappy(honesty), that you didn't feel you would be able to do your job that day(honesty) and since you sincerely care about the companies bottom line, you didn't want to potentially give anything to any of the other employees(faithful, honest AND kind). Most likely he will thank you for your honesty and this trust can go a long way. If you play hookey all the time for no reason, see rule #4. scenario #3: You start a small company and you need to buy parts from someone else on a regular basis for this company. The person in charge at your supplier tells you that they require money down. Don't try to tell him thats not acceptable since it's probably for good reason(reasonable). Explain that it's fine(kind to others, reasonable) and that even if the company itself doesn't go well despite your best efforts, you will make sure that he gets paid even if it's out of your own pocket(kind to others, honesty) Chances are, if you deal with them on a regular basis and get to know them as a person as well as a business contact, when push comes to shove and you REALLY need something (can't make it that day to put a down payment on an order) they will come through for you. In this scenario, it doesn't hurt to pick up the phone once in a while and make sure you don't owe them anything, even if you are fairly sure you don't. This lets them know that you actually care that you are paid up. Generally, they will treat you better as well. I have actually had this exact scenario in real life. Every person I dealt with would do nearly anything they could for me even after only knowing me for 6 months. Eventually, the company did have problems and I did need to pay for some stuff out of my own pocket, but overall, we(and me) made money and everyone is happy. The best part is, I made new friends AND if I ever need anything from any of these places later to start another company, all I need to do is pick up the phone and it's taken care of. scenario #4: You and a bunch of people are casually BS'ing at the end of a day. You sort of let slip something that's really not very nice to one of the people that sort of sounds insulting, but you just sort of pretend it didn't happen. You realize the next day that you very well might have hurt someones feelings or made them mad. A simple Hey, sorry bout yesterday, didn't mean it that way sort of thing in passing when talking to them the next day can truly help smooth things over(Accepting the consequences, honesty, kind, reasonable all at the same time). This is also something that has happened to me in real life except I was on the receiving end of it. I felt a lot better about the person after they talked to me. To this day I have nothing but respect for this person. He is one hellava stand up guy. There you have it. These simple rules will allow you to lead a more productive and happy life. You don't need to be a pushover, you don't need to be mean but you can be a stand up person whom everyone admires and it's not so hard to do. -P
	S.T.A.L.K.E.R. update	2007-09-04 -P
I finally managed to find someone who most likely broke the TOS and put the latest patches on thier site, installed the patches, went and got myself another gig of ram and now the game is playable. It's still not great and it still has the odd hiccup for anywhere from 1 to 30 seconds at a time, but only once in a while. Overall, I must say the game has grown on me. It very nearly was worth the extra hassle and extra cost of the ram. One thing to be sure of though is to make sure that you read a walkthrough and try your best to stick to the storyline until you get past the duty guards. If you don't do this at the beginning, it seems to break the game and you can't ever get past them. I think the best part about this game is that an excellent gamer can't finish it in a day. It's basically a FPS adventure/RPG. It's not nearly as polished as something like HALO or HALF-LIFE 2, but I think this game is a very good value for the money. It keeps you entertained for weeks on end and it's a rich universe that holds your interest. Here's my 2 cents worth overall Software Quality I would give it a 7 out of 10 simply because of the initial hassles and the hiccups it experiences from time to time. Gameplay, I would give it a 9 out of 10 since the game is very entertaining. Value for the money, I would give it a 10 out of 10. It might have it's problems initially, but for the money, I have yet to play a single player game that provides such enduring entertainment. THQ: you know what makes a game great, if you can just get your development house to polish things a little more under the hood, you will soon be a serious contender in the PC game market.
	Video Game Patches	2007-08-15 -P
Say I make a great video game and release it to the public at a $60.00 price point. Now lets pretend that I pushed this product out the door so full of bugs that it's nearly unplayable. Any reasonable company publishes regular patch updates for any releases they have so even though they might have pushed a product out before its time, they sort of save grace by making right what was wrong in the first place. I have had many experiences where you need to download a patch to make a game playable. It might get under my skin that I can't just install and play, but I do it anyway since the current generation of fps games is pretty amazing and definitely worth the hassle. Whats the QUICKEST way to make any gamer mad? PUBLISH THE PATCHES ON A COMMERCIAL SITE THAT REQUIRES YOU TO LAY DOWN CASH FOR AN ACCOUNT WITH THEM JUST TO BE ABLE TO PLAY THE GAME YOU ALREADY PAID FOR! In this particular case, I'm talking about YOU THQ. Your game stalker is so buggy out of the box I nearly turfed it in the garbage and I'm not even kidding. How hard is it to PREFETCH textures and meshes BEFORE they are visible? I'll answer for you, IT'S NOT! Walking up the initial stairs, even moving an inch at a time, the game would hang for anywhere from ~1 to ~30 seconds while it fetches information from the disk. Pretty outrageous to say the least, but to add insult to injury by having your OFFICIAL patch site require me to sign up for something? It's utter bullshit. Admittedly, if I had prodded and poked, I could have probably found out how to get a free account or the likes, but why don't you just host the damn patches on your own site? Thats what its FOR! Don't cry the bandwidth blues in this day and age, you can get a full unmetered 10megabits/second for 1/10th what you would pay a full time employee. As usual, YMMV.
	FreeBSD on the toshiba libretto 70CT	2007-06-26 -P
Years ago, I had seen a toshiba libretto at a local computer store and was floored by its itty bitty size, portability and at the time, computing power(it's the size of a vhs tape, literally). These days that same line of machines (50, 60, 70CT) is a bit short on raw number crunching power by current standards, but they are STILL just as cute, adorable and ultra portable. This is why I decided to buy one and stuff it full of FreeBSD. I hung out on ebay for a couple months till I found a good 70CT that I managed to win. Once it finally got here, I set about installing and setting up a lean mean FreeBSD system for it. Since I havent done anything of consequence since I got sick, I asked around to see what currently is the best version for mobile/laptops. A friend on IRC said the 6.X branch has had TONS of work done to it specifically for laptops so I gave it a try. The install went fine, didnt hang, booted up okay, but the PCMCIA didnt work right so I didnt have any network. I ended up trying some other releases that I had on CD lying around and 4.3 ended up being the magic bullet out of the ones I had, so I stuck with it. From there it was just a matter of configuring and setting everything up. The general config and setup is pretty much like a regular machine, but there are a few differences. In order to have your PCMCIA work, you need to enable the pc card daemon in your rc.conf and you also need to set up a little script to add the network information. I just make a quick one called network.sh in my root directory. When I stuff the nic in, I just run it and it configs the network card and adds a default route for it. This is whats in it: ifconfig ed1 inet 10.0.0.7 netmask 255.255.255.0 and the next line: route add default 10.0.0.1 As you can see, nothing fancy but it saves typing. :) The next step was to build a decent kernel for it and without the other processor support code and other crap for hardware I dont have. I blew away all the nics I dont have, all the scsi crap, etc. I also discovered that to make sound work, you really DO need to make sure you tell the kernel just how to talk to the card. device pcm followed by device sbc0 at isa? port 0x220 irq 5 drq 0 flags 0x15 seems to work for mine. Note that if you use this in your kernel, make sure to check the bios (hit escape during POST) and make sure the card is set to those settings. X was also pretty straight forward, a simple svga server and 640X480 at 24bpp seems to work fine. I also trimmed down all the start up crap so it only starts with the WM (enlightenment). To browse the web and not eat all the ram, I installed the dillo web browser. Man is dillo fast. In fact, its so amazingly fast, you wont believe it! :) Now I have unix in my pocket! soon, I will be adding a custom li-poly pack that piggybacks the existing pack to extend run time to 6+ hours and of course, installing more apps, etc. All in all, I would recommend the project to any decently experienced FreeBSD user but beginners beware, had I not had quite a bit of experience with FreeBSD and unix in general, this would have been one long drawn out project. Even as it was, getting the sound mixer to work right was a nightmare to get right. Most of the time with FreeBSD, it's just a matter of compiling a default kernel and most stuff just works out of the box. Not with this little beauty. (= As usual, ymmv. -P
	Multi tier internet service?	2006-03-06 -P
Some of the bigger american internet provides figure that the paying broadband customers money just isnt good enough to continue to provide a high level of service. They now want to provide a default "poor" level of service to the internet and then expect the sites at the other end to ante up the cash to get "good" levels of service to said sites. This is complete bullshit. The big telcos ACTUALLY figure that google, yahoo, etc are getting a free ride of some sort. Here is what I have to say to them. Please note, all these big sites you refer to as getting "a free ride" are actually PAYING for the right to be on the net already. Fibre isn't free and neither is the bandwidth. They have already paid to be online. The one thing you dont realize is that you will need to filter ALL of the internet, not just a select few. I could whip up a proxy to bypass your stupid multi tier service in an hour and thats a fact. Your plan is flawed and will not work. Before you go trying to intentionally break something, maybe you should learn how the damn thing even works to begin with and no, clicking icons in windows doesnt count. -P
	High Resolution Photography	2006-01-18 -P
As anyone who knows me personally will tell you, I am a rather serious photographer these days. I have been shooting film for years and have recently bought a D70 to replace my film cameras despite my flirtation with large format. Now don't get me wrong, I think the D70 is most likely one of the best digital cameras made, however having said that, it is STILL a digital camera. That means you generally need to live with the resolution that the manufacturer gave you. I have known for ages that it is possible in software to seamlessly stitch together multiple images from the same camera and make a single LARGE image from multiple smaller ones. I have recently started doing this. I offer an example. Click the image to see a bigger version. As you can see, there is quite a lot of detail in this image. The sample is NOT at original resolution, the file is 1/2 a gig and 162 megapixels. That translates to a print of about 6 feet by 2 1/2 feet at a standard resolution of 300 DPI. To put that in perspective, it would be 12 feet by 5 feet printed at a reasonable 150 DPI. As mentioned before, I had considered moving to large format since I primarily do landscape photography. The nice thing about that is that now with this new technique of multiple image stitching, I can really make images of any size required. If I want to take a 1 gigapixel image of something, just take it. If I just want a single 6MP image, take it, or take any variation in between. Some of the examples I have done are almost 1/2 a gigapixel and I plan on taking some test shots of around over 1 GP soon. Thus far, the only serious problems I have encountered is that stitching these takes TONS of ram and tons of fast disks for swap. Having said that, I have all those things so it's not so bad! To be honest, I think the days of film are coming to an eventual end.
	My Tunes	2006-01-18 -P
Just for kicks and giggles, I uploaded some tunes I've been writing over the last year or so. Every morning when I wake up I just pick up my guitar and drop down a random drum beat and see what comes out. Some of it isn't half bad considering I have never redone any of them. I make it up as I go! Fun stuff. Here is a link
	State of the world	2005-08-20 -P
Here is a dead true quote that I found on the web today. It says it like it really is. The President of the United States always has the option of unleashing Armageddon if he so chooses. Normally, however, sanity prevails. -P
	Holy cow, a whole year!	2005-06-24 -P
Wow, was it really last year since my last entry? And I thought I might really get into this here blog thing. Should I even have bothered to code the backend for it? :) Ah well, it was good practice (for what I don't know, its trivial code really) Things i've been up to... Feeling rather ill these days. In fact, ive been feeling very ill since my last entry(it all makes sense to me now) I seem to be suffering from this CFS thing also called chronic fatigue syndrome or depending on who you ask, also fybromalagia. To make a very long story short, it makes you tired and sleep all the time. Imagine having a bad case of mono nucleosis ALL the time. Thats me lately. Sucks ass, let me tell ya. Things could be worse though. I have some new ideas that ive been working on, one in particular is pretty cool. I drive an older toyota camry that averages about 35-36 miles to the gallon on the highway. Doing some research into aerodynamics lately, ive come up with an idea to up it by quite a bit for very little work. Im currently averaging around 40 miles to the gallon now by controlling the boundary layer at the rear of the vehicle. Its not a miracle cure to give you a billion jillion miles to the gallon, but here in canada, every little bit counts, gas is pushing towards a loonie a litre. Its basically the same thing as how a smooth golf ball doesnt go worth a crap and a dimpled one goes way farther. Its all about the boundary layer control. The scary part about the whole project was just how low tech the hardware is yet how high tech figuring out how to apply it is. I ended up doing lots of browsing of nasa archives and a bunch of aerospace sites to find out how they control the boundary layer on high performance aircraft. Ends up that some small vortex generators installed on the roof of the vehicle works like a charm but ONLY if installed in the right location. I first tried to find it by trial and error but ended up just going through some online courses on applied aerodynamics to figure out just HOW the damn things worked. After setting em up properly on my vehicle, the milage is noticably better. Id actually try and sell these things to other people, but I know how that whole thing goes, someone else will just steal it and beat me to the punch. Reminds me of a patent I was getting on self cleaning humidifiers in the late 80's early 90's. (personal grudge rant goes here.) Cheers! :)
	NIKON D70 BACKFOCUS	2004-05-28 -P
I recently bought myself a brand spankin new Nikon D70. Out of the box, it was an EXCELLENT camera. It feels good in the hand, it's BLISTERING fast compared to non SLR prosumer digicam and the battery life is excellent. Fit and finish is above expectations and in general, it is just a well designed camera. All of my photos initially were excellent. During this time I was still shooting exclusively on auto focus. Since I am a hardcore kind of photographer, I like to shoot manual everything when I can and since I was feeling pretty comfy with the camera after a few weeks, during a recent trip, I decided to shoot everything on manual focus. I was in for a rather large and nasty surprise... EVERY SINGLE IMAGE I had taken on the trip was garbage. I was blown away. Then I was mad, how the hell could a serious amateur photo buff (keep in mind I also DESIGN hardware and software for a living) such as myself botch so many darn pictures? Having my doubts as it being all MY fault, I decided to hit some message boards to see what was up. Sure enough, it sounds like focus problems are a known issue with the D70. With this in mind, I wasnt about to use the camera in this condition. Thanks to a very smart russian fella, the D70 crowd now knows its possible to fix(or hack) this issue. Its done by adjusting the mirror stop screws inside the front lens mount. These screws are offset stops that you adjust by turning them slightly. This sets the position of the mirrors relative to the CCD. If you browse the nikonians website you will find the russian fellas link and he has nice pictures of what all is entailed. For those who are tech savy here is a breakdown of how it works. To fix the backfocus problem, insert your 2mm allen key and tweak the BACK screw close to the imaging device a bit... You turn the allen key UP, as in the end outside the camera starts low and you move it up. This causes autofocus to focus closer. To fix the manual focus(mine was horrible, it looked like pinhole photography, and im not kidding in the least here) since you can SEE the fat and skinny side of the screw that adjusts the manual focus, keep this in mind (its the one closest to the lens inside. The main mirror you can see rests on it.) Making the mirror CLOSER to the focusing screen made the focus FARTHER away. From a hardware perspective, there is definitely something to the focus issues with the D70. Diopter adjusments will not fix the issues with manual focus just as wearing a different eyeglass prescription won't make a blurry image on a 4X5 any clearer. If the image on the focus screen is blurry, its blurry and optics wont fix that. Thankfully, I spent the better part of 4 hours setting mine up to get it bang on with both manual and auto (its an AWEFUL lot of work... it ranks up there will juggling chainsaws for 4 hours). Dust worries? Its gunna happen sooner or later and honestly, if your camera is a hunk of junk because of focus issues, dust wont matter anyway. If your technically savy and you have the time and patience, you too can have an absolutely top notch camera. -P PS: make sure your battery is new and fully charged. you really dont want to be crashing your mirror into your allen key from it letting the mirror down prematurely.
	UNITS CONVERSION IN UNIX	2004-05-06 -P
man units The units program converts quantities expressed in various scales to their equivalents in other scales. The units program can only handle multiplicative scale changes. It cannot convert Celsius to Fahrenheit, for example. It works interactively by prompting the user for input... -P
	C, C++ AND MYSQL	2004-04-26 -P
I can count the number of times I have developed unix applications in C and C++ that use mysql on the fingers on a single hand. It seems that every time I do so, I have the same old problems... Linking against the mysql C libraries. In a fit of code rage, I discovered a new little command line tool that comes with mysql that will tell you the exact linking options you need to use. Its called mysql_config. Just type mysql_config at the command line to be greeted with the exact c flags and linking options that you need. This can greatly reduce your frustration. Some examples of not having the correct flags (or needed libraries) are compile time errors such as... undefined reference to `mysql_init' undefined reference to `mysql_real_connect' undefined reference to `mysql_query' undefined reference to `mysql_store_result' undefined reference to `mysql_fetch_row' undefined reference to `mysql_free_result' undefined reference to `mysql_close' as always, if you need/want to, you can contact me via email at my addy at the top. -P
	FreeBSD REMOTE X	2004-04-20 -P
Here is a little unix tidbit for those who want to run X apps across the network. Maybe you want to run etherape on your gateway and watch it on your workstation or run mozilla on your buddies machine and have the GUI displayed on YOUR X server(why waste YOUR cycles or get blamed for browsing plappy.com right?) The one thing that kills alot of beginners when they use a newer FreeBSD release is that they can not seem to get this to work... Thankfully, there is a simple explanation. The startx startup script has a listen_tcp="-nolisten tcp" line in it. Heres how you get this stuff to work... On your local X workstation, edit the /usr/X11R6/bin/startx script, comment out the listen_tcp="-nolisten tcp" line with your favorite editor(vi? :P). next type xhost + (Please note this disables any sort of authorization to use your x server, learn ipfw, ipfw2 or ipf. It is important if you can not trust other machines on the network or your IP is routable to the internet) now, shell into the remote computer you want to run the X app on. Making sure you are using bash (other shells work but the syntax is different) type DISPLAY="10.0.0.1:0" and hit enter, please replace 10.0.0.1 with the IP of your workstation that you want it to connect to. Now type export DISPLAY and hit enter. At this point, you are ready to fire up the app on the remote machine that you want to have connect back to your workstation. Remote X sessions are cool. You can run your internet browser on one machine, run your email client on another, run your MP3 player on another (yes the sound is output on the remote machine.) and all sorts of other neato burrito stuff. To run your app, just type its name like this... mozilla & The ampersand puts the process in the background and now your shell knows that this app should connect to the remote display you specified with DISPLAY="blah:0" As always, remember that google and man are your friend. Happy remote X'ing! -P
	MPAA : RIAA MOVIES, MUSIC, P2P AND LIFE	2004-04-15 -P
It's rant time everyone, let me tell you what brings this on... Have you been to a movie in the theater recently? Have you seen the whole speil they have at the start of every one of them now about 'downloading off the internet' ? I've seen this more times than I care to remember and its really getting under my skin. There are simple reasons for this, first a little quote from betanews that I found with a quick google search. *** Start Quote *** During a Senate Judiciary Hearing Tuesday, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin questioned RIAA President Cary Sherman regarding the group's recent legal tactics, according to an Associated Press report. "Are you headed to junior high schools to round up the usual suspects?" asked Durbin. Durwood Pickle, a 71-year-old grandfather from Richardson, Texas, is also facing the wrath of the recording industry after his teenage sons downloaded music to his PC while visiting. Because of the methods utilized by the RIAA to locate file swappers, those contacted were not necessarily the individuals actually downloading music, simply the persons who paid for the Internet access. But the RIAA is content with its grenade approach. "We're trying to send a strong message that you are not anonymous when you participate in peer-to-peer file sharing," said RIAA chief executive Mitch Bainwol in a statement. "Parents need to be aware of what their children are doing on their computers." The group warns it may file lawsuits against "thousands more" by the end of the year. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), an advocacy group for digital rights, strongly criticized the recording industry's recent actions. "More lawsuits is not the answer," said EFF Staff Attorney Wendy Seltzer. "Does anyone think that suing 60 million American file-sharers is going to motivate them to buy more CDs?" *** END QUOTE *** How's Them apples? Sueing 12 year old children and thier grandparents is not the way to make your mark in the world. I for one am pissed off about these groups (yes, you too MPAA) and thier actions. Thier claim that p2p is killing thier music is total BS (*I* use p2p to make money, I KNOW it works, don't bother to try to sway me on it. The greenbacks it provides feed me, that is a simple fact.) The music industry has had huge spikes of sales at every upswing in the p2p arena(I think it is time for an audit, lets see those numbers for real). The fact that alot of thier music is doing poorly MOSTLY has to do with the fact that its crap. Also, most of the movies I see these days are crap. I do not like to see or hear crap, therefore I will not BUY crap. I might download it to see how crappy it really is, but to be honest, I would rather see a good show in a good theater with good audio than watch a crap cam'ed divx or vcd rip on my PC(Therefore, it is NOT lost revenue. That simple. I am NOT going to buy it.). I do not buy because I do not like. I also do not buy because the industry is attacking me directly. Think all these legal issues are new? Not a chance, history repeats itself. Same thing happened over the home VCR. The argument at THAT time is that it was going to completely kill the cinema. Well, 'lo and behold, it is now a good portion of the income for the people who produce the movies. Audio cassettes? same thing, recordable, gotta kill it, the consumer must NOT have the choice to use things as they see fit. This is just the start of the legal nonsense going on in the world today. Here is a few more. ->Patenting hyperlinks on the internet (someone smack whoever even considered that.) ->Outlawing consumer cryptography (great, I want every hacker on earth to know my credit card number) ->Taxing email (get real, I could code a new system to replace it in a day...) ->Taxing private network bandwidth (Does this include my pci bus? my backplane network? do the people who want to do this even know what those things are?) ->Taxes on internet radio stations far greater than regular stations (sounds fair to me, how bout you?) Now for some other things that just plain annoy me in this electronic world. ->Non banks wanting my credit card info (you have NO business with it, no, your computer system is NOT secure, if it is, can I see a detailed summary of your last security audit? Guess what, if ya want it just so you can charge me if im late for a movie or because of some unpaid charge, forget it, ill charge it back and you will be SOL, if I owe you, just tell me, ill pay you, I know its a rare thing these days but im honest that way.) ->Non Government places wanting my SIN number. (Movie rental places, grocery stores, landlords, banks, etc have no need of this info. Its for tax purposes. Period. Why do banks seem to require this these days? Is the government watching my transactions? Is that not a breach of privacy? Just for you information, the government DOES electronically monitor your accounts. Move 10K-20K around lots for a while in cash and see how long it takes for you to get a visit.) ->Everyone suing everyone for everything. (I got whiplash in an accident when I was younger too. It hurts like hell. Money is not going to fix that and how could I live with myself knowing I made life horrible for someone else INTENTIONALLY) ->Spam. (No, you can NOT get rid of it, it makes money. Keep your email off peoples lists, do not sign yourself or friends/family up for online cards, etc. The ONLY place you type an email address is the TO box of your email program. *or to line if your a console kiddie). ->Taxes on hardware. (Who is the government to decide if im using something for a particular purpose?) ->Privacy (You don't have any, do not even bother to ponder the notion you do. If you get paid money and use money, you are tracked. Same with phones, your grocery store purchasing habits, etc. Just try purchasing saltpeter sulphur and charcoal at the same time somewhere. I bet these days, someone will pay you a visit.) THE BOTTOM LINE Here is the bottom line. The world is a'changin and we need to change with it. The same way that blacksmiths and people who shovel coal had to. It's a complete shift in paradigm. The way the world fundamentally works is changing so fast, laws and lawmakers can not keep up. No way is uploading thousands of songs as bad a crime as murder. No way should someone be watching my finances without me knowing. Common sense should rule, but unfourtunately, common sense is'nt. It's a shame. If capital punishment does not stop murder, how will the same process make people bend to the will of corporations? If you have that answer, you should contact the RIAA and MPAA. Im sure they have a big stack of money just waiting to line your pockets. Having said all that, I have a deep personal fondness for other people and therefore I offer the following tip of advice. People, be careful with your personal information and your electronic actions. Once your info is out, its out. No going back and you might be far more sorry in the future than you think. And that is my 2 cents... -P PS: Yes, I know about SCO, they will just sco away.
	TUNE-A-FISH 1.01A RELEASE	2004-04-06 -P
New tunafish version... Added some minor error checking code and fixed some bugs relating to a crash when source directories contained subdirectories. Thanks to Neo for pointing that one out. -P DOWNLOAD TUNE-A-FISH 1.01A HERE COMING SOON... TWEAKAFISH(Tweaks win2k and xp settings to increase speed in some systems) and SQUISHAFISH(compresses your tunes into mobile windows media formats so you can fit more on your storage card)
	TUNE-A-FISH 1.0 ALPHA RELEASED	2004-04-02 -P
I have released a new free software product called Tune-a-fish. It is currently in alpha development but seems to be rock solid at this point. This application is used to quickly browse and make compilations of your mp3 tunes. Source and destination directories are configurable and it has a cool feature called quickskip that allows you to skim through songs at a rather rapid pace. It beats windows explorer and a player all to hell. I built this for my own use but I am releasing it for others to enjoy as well. You can download the alpha version at the link below. This is a single packed exe, it will install as is, you don't even need to unpack it to install. If you are using IE you can even run it from location. Please email me any bug reports you may have and let me know how you like it. Also feel free to nag me for future features, etc. Enjoy! :) -P TUNE-A-FISH 1.0A DOWNLOAD
	CHEAP SWITCHING SUPPLIES	2004-03-23 -P
Something has occured to me over the last bit while I work on my new RV, why is it that its almost impossible to find a decent 13.8-14.4 regulated switching supply of any decent wattage with built in current limit, etc for charging batteries? EVERY battery charger I see on the market is still old fashioned 60hz laminated iron core stuff. Why in gods name not take advantage of the newer technology and create a decent 20-40 amp regulated charger and make the dang thing a smart supply that wont overload and wont "shut off" when someone accidentally shorts it for a second or 2 (ive converted computer supplies before to 13.0-14.4 volts out for battery charging and they always do that.) This brings me to another thought that I had a while back, I think one of the next electronics projects I do will be a tightly regulated variable voltage supply with built in output limiting via max PWM duty cycle... Basic idea is to use a PIC12C508 unit as a smart controller and have a seperate low power transformer run it and associated logic, an input pin is either high or low depending on the output of a voltage sense cct using a single op amp to run it rail to rail(5v of course) This chip will then do the software pwm and drive a modified computer supply via the optocoupler which will be disconnected from its original controller. This gives us all sorts of flexibility... we can limit overall output by limiting the maximum duty cycle, we can limit current surges by having it bring itself up to voltage slowly over time, but QUICKLY dropping the drive if the output is disconnected, we can make it software current limiting via a few dip switches to toggle some input pins for those times you want to set max charge current or when you want to have a maintenance mode (14.4V output for a second or so every so often just to prevent sulphation, etc) If I ever get around to this project ill post the source code for it here and you can check it out. -P
	MY PERSONAL VIEWS	2004-03-23 -P
plappy!)(*@#$)*@#$ Things that are cool: -SGI Computers -Unix (Irix, FreeBSD) -Programming(c, c++, java, eiffel, smalltalk, ada, etc) -Programmers -Computer Processor Design -ALU Design -Helicopters -Nice Girlies -Money -Soft Fluffy Things(shut up, ill kick yer ass) -Shiny things -pic12c508a's -lans -Air Conditioning Things that are uncool: -Taxes -Consumer Windows OS's -Bitchy Chicks(get bent!) -Lack of lan -Summer Weather -MCSE's (IT for the complete quadriplegic tard) THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW E/IR p1v1/t1=p2v2/t2 A nice tcsh prompt set prompt = '%n@%m:%~%# '
	FIRST ENTRY	2004-03-22 -P
This is the very first entry to my new blog. I decided to write this simple blog software because of one simple reason, every other free blog php software I tried was poo... The install scripts were broken or they depended on a particular php version, or required globals to be on... Mine is simple, an output script, some icons and a script to add them... There is NO auth on the add script, if you decide to use mine, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE use some form of auth, either code it in yourself or do it server side (htaccess isnt rocket surgeory) you can download it here What sort of licence do I give for it? download it, delete it, steal it, modify it, sell it, I don't care, it's just a simple hours for me anyway... -P

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