davintosh

Here’s something fun; a ‘manual’ straight from Haynes on Wallace & Gromit’s Cracking Contraptions!

I’ve probably enjoyed the Wallace & Gromit claymation movies more than the kids; Gromit is probably the most entertaining of the pair, even though he never speaks a word.

A few favorites from YouTube…
The Tellyscope
The Bully-Proof Vest
And The Turbo Diner… “That’s 300 horsepower of pure suck! Not bad, eh?”

I picked one of these headlamps up on sale at Lowe’s yesterday for $12 — it was the last of a Black Friday special on the shelf — and it’s already earned its keep, although my neighbors must think I’ve lost some marbles… Tonight Bryce & I spent the last hour of the day (11 to midnight!) hanging Christmas lights on the outside of the house (before the weather turns sour tomorrow) and yesterday I used it to finish up the front end rebuild under the 735i; finished that one up about 10 pm.

These headlamps are just a huge help in working on a car, and so much better than the old-fashioned trouble light. Wearing it on my forehead, it puts the light right where it needs to be without a light fixture getting in the way, as is the case with a trouble light. I turn my head, the light goes with it so I can see what I’m looking at. I haven’t used it during the day, but it would even being a huge help then; if I’m under a car it seems the light is never good, and this thing will do the same trick then.

My new headlamp has three lighting modes,

• Bright 1-watt LED spot; ~ 45 lumens, 11 hour run time
• 2 bright Nichia LED’s flood; ~ 28 lumens, 50 hour run time
• 2 bright red night vision LED and 75 hour run time

About the only thing I don’t like about it is the switch; it’s a push-button switch on the top of the lamp. One click turns on the 1-watt LED, second click turns on the red LEDs, third click turns on the flood light, and the fourth turns it off. The switch is also a bit difficult to click, which may be a defect of some sort with my particular unit. But the don’t-likes are pretty minor issues; all in all it’s a great little tool.

I do think I’ll put some day-glow orange or pink paint on it though so it doesn’t get lost like my last headlamp did.

Here’s a great product… The Rescue Reel.

I remember having similar thoughts on 9/11, seeing people jumping out of those burning skyscrapers… There should be a better option for people in a situation like that than making a decision between dying by fire/smoke or by jumping.

Looks like it allows anyone to rappel down the side of a building even if they don’t know how to rappel. I’ve rappelled before, but I’d be hard-pressed to back out of a broken window on what I remember from those lessons ten years ago. If I worked in a high-rise building, I think I would spend my own money for the peace of mind something like the Rescue Reel would provide.

via Newsweek.

On my aging PowerBook G4 I usually have both Firefox and Safari open; Firefox because of the wonder of AdBlock Plus, and Safari because its controls are much more intuitive, and it’s able to render so many sites so much better than Firefox. Now, finally, there’s a chance I can just stick with Safari;

Safari 5.0.1 introduces extensions: a great way for you to add new features to Safari. Built by developers, Safari Extensions use the latest HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript web technologies. And they’re digitally signed and sandboxed for improved security. You can install extensions with one click — no need to restart Safari.

Scrolling through the list of available extensions I immediately installed AdBlock for Safari.

So far it seems to be working well, but I just installed it like five minutes ago, so the jury is still out.

The main reason I want (or need) the ability to block ads is because of the proliferation of Flash-based advertising… I’ve learned the hard way that Flash and PPC processors just do not mix. It seems that most any commercial site I visit is plastered from top to bottom with Flash ads screaming for attention, but more concerning with my crappy trusty old computer is the amount of CPU time those ads consume; just a few Flash thingys on a web page is enough to slow my computer to a crawl. And if I’m not connected to an AC adapter, I can just watch my battery life drop like a rock. Facebook is a terrible offender in this regard; Flash every-stinkin’-where. Apple has been far too slow to allow developers to extend Safari; thank goodness for Firefox.

So I’m a happier camper today! That’s one nice little ray of sunshine in a week that’s provided my life with nothing but clouds and rain and danged few silver linings. Thank you Apple!

If I ever become a death metal rock star (yeah, that’s me all over!) this stand will accompany me in every concert. So awesome.

Interesting back story on the stand in the Wired article.

My kids have asked me before why it is that driving a computer-simulated car in a video game is so much different than driving a real car. My off-the-cuff answer has been that the controls in the video game are usually much cruder than those in a real car. Imagine if you were driving down the highway and your steering was controlled by two buttons for left & right, the throttle was an on-off switch, as was your brake. Controls like that in a video game make driving pretty dodgy, but if it were in real life… I’m glad I don’t have to share the road with vehicles like that! Cars would have to be just as indestructible as their game-world kin.

The guys in this video were wondering something similar; how it would work if you tried to control a real vehicle from the typical video game driving perspective. The results, even with normal vehicular controls, are pretty hilarious. (There is some foul language in the video, so keep the volume low or headphones on if there are kids nearby!)

I’m guessing the drivers could improve with a little practice. Or maybe a lot of practice.

Apple just introduced the iPad, and I want one. You can read about all the details and watch the demo movie in lots of places, so I won’t spend any time on that…

I just want one.

I helped a friend set up her new 27″ iMac last weekend, and it came with the coolest new mouse… The Apple Magic Mouse.

The mouse is the button, plus it has no scroll wheel, but you can use it to scroll up, down, diagonally and sideways. Comes in one color, wireless Bluetooth, but right now is only supported for use on a Mac (Windows support is coming!) The way it works is similar to the MacBook trackpads with multiple-finger functions, but that is a couple of steps above the trackpad on my getting-older-by-the-day PowerBook G4! I want one!

Actually, these would be great for use at work; seems like I’m replacing a mouse somewhere in the building at least once a week. The failures are usually with the scroll wheels, and the Apple Mighty Mouse with its tiny little scroll ball is the worst offender. The Magic Mouse with no external moving parts should be nothing but great! And as great as this mouse is, the tablet computer that Apple is expected to announce should be nothing less than amazing.

This is not only a great idea, it could be a real hoot putting it together!

A Pictorial Guide to avoiding Camera Loss

Have you lost your camera recently? Mislaid it somewhere in a national park? Left it in a taxi? Dropped it in the gorilla pit? Anyone can be a victim of the thoughtlessness and/or sleepiness that can lead to Camera Loss…

Of course it’s not sure-fire, but it at least gives you a better chance of getting back a lost camera than the ordinary assortment of anonymous images normally found on a camera.

All kinds of clever things come to mind for a little slideshow on my camera… The only problem I’d foresee is having to change my practice of letting iPhoto remove the photos from the card when it’s done importing them. But I can change.

A couple of years ago my sister-in-law met and married a Dutch dairy farmer; around here that wouldn’t be much of a feat because there are plenty of Dutch dairy farmers in Northwest Iowa… but they now live on the farm in Holland! Keeping up with family means Skype and long airline rides are pretty much the norm. They made the trip back for a holiday visit a couple of weeks ago, and had some fun showing off (via photos & video anyway) the new toys they installed in the dairy barn; two milking robots.

The robots were designed & built by Lely, a Dutch farm equipment manufacturer. And they truly are robots; aside from routine maintenance, they require no human intervention to milk the cows. They and the cows just hum along, day and night, and in the process milk production is bumped up by a decent amount, which allows the dairyman to increase the size of the herd and focus on other details of running the farm. They really are pretty amazing:

• The cows are trained to walk into the machines when they feel the need to be milked (on average, 2.8 times a day)
• RFID tags allow the machine to recognize individual cows as they enter.
• A portion of feed is dispensed that is custom blended to meet that particular individual’s nutritional needs.
• The robot cleans the udder & teats,
• It then uses a laser tracking system to locate the individual teats and attaches a suction device to each and begins milking.
• When finished, it detaches from the cow and turns her loose from the stall.
• The robot then cleans the suction devices and prepares for the next cow.
• As the milk is drawn, the quantity tracked, and the chemical composition is analyzed to diagnose potential health problems in the cow.
• If the analysis shows the milk fails to meet predetermined quality standards, the milk is discarded.
• The computer controlling the robot also keeps statistics for the entire herd, allowing the dairyman to keep track of trends and potential issues with individual cows.

Since the thing is controlled by standard PC hardware, they were able to pull up the machine via VNC to check up on things; it was evening when he was showing this to me, but about 3 am local time at the farm, and we saw that a cow had just stepped into the machine. Apparently one of the things that helps to boost milk production is that the old way of doing things — milking twice a day — doesn’t really fit with a cow’s natural cycles, as is shown in the stats with the robot; on average, they will go in to be milked 2.8 times a day. And they will go in at all times of the day and night, whenever they feel the need to be milked, which I would think makes for happier cows!

The video below shows the machine in action;