Shameless Plug.

Oh, by the way, I finally got this set up today. My quest for global domination has begun.

Furnishing

My lovely wife found this light fixture online at Lumens, and she knew it would be perfect for our dining room. It’s a new edition of a George Nelson classic, and I think it fits the room (and the vibe of the house) perfectly.

Meanwhile, we’ve got a different light up for sale on Craigslist. Honk if you’re interested!

InDesign CS3 Gotcha

Gotcha! (Gotcher $1,000 too, suckers!)

Who Called?

www.whocalled.us has information on unlisted caller ID numbers, lookups, and a comments section to share information.

Change of Heart.

This is quick note about a conversation Jen and I had with our neighbors yesterday evening, which was still on my mind as I fell asleep last night. We live next to an ex-serviceman/retired public official and his wife, who are both intensely religious and outwardly Republican. (There are multiple anti-abortion bumper stickers on their vehicles, and they display various religious themed signs on their front lawn year-round.) Despite our differences of opinion, we get along with them very well. During our visit, the subject of Iraq came up, and their comments stopped me in my tracks: They called the war a terrible thing, compared it to Vietnam, and plainly stated that they thought our troops should come home. I felt as if someone was shuffling the tectonic plates underneath my feet as we spoke.

Memo to Mesrrs. Bush, Rove, and Cheney: Your key demographic smells the bullshit.

Keyboard and Mouse Sharing

Lifehacker ran a fantastic tip today on sharing a keyboard and mouse among multiple computers. Synergy is cross-platform, open source software, and it took about five minutes to set up on my two Macs here, allowing me to FINALLY remove a full-size keyboard from my crowded desk. I’m now considering installing it on the Thinkpad to see if I can do away with the second mouse. (OS X download here.)

Coda

I use an older Windows-based program called HomeSite daily to do my heavy lifting when I’m building sites, with a liberal sprinkling of Dreamweaver and some BBEdit for the things HS can’t do. When I heard that Panic, the shop behind Transmit (an excellent FTP client for OS X) just came out with Coda, billed as a new editor/ftp client/reference app all in one, I was very interested.

I’m downloading it now to give it a test spin this week-it’s always hard switching from one workflow to the next, but I like the reasoning behind creation of the app: …our web workflow was wonky. We’d have our text editor open, with Transmit open to seave files to the server. We’d be previewing in Safari, running queries in Terminal, using a CSS editor, and reading references on the web.

This sounds much like my workflow—I’ve usually got Parallels running HomeSite and Explorer in a virtual window, Safari and Firefox open for testing in OS X, Transmit to upload (HomeSite’s “built-in FTP client” is a joke) and another two or three browser tabs open for reference. (Plus Photoshop, Illustrator, and/or ImageReady.) Usually I’ll offload some of the testing and viewing duties to a secondary machine, usually the Thinkpad to my left, so that I don’t have to continually cycle through windows to see what I need. But that’s clunky, and it takes time to set up each workflow—especially when I’m cycling through multiple projects like I often do on a daily basis. One of the promises of this new app is that workflows are saved exactly as they are left, so one would be able to pick up right where one left off on a day-to-day basis. (This feature is implemented somewhat crudely by HomeSite, but not in a way I’ve been able to make useful.)

While I usually have a strong dislike for having multiple UI views in one app, I’m interested to see how Coda handles all of these functions and how Panic implemented them. I hope they have some kind of quick key for tabbing through views so that I don’t have to rely on the mouse to move around. I also hope it’s more stable than Dreamweaver, which still acts like a narcoleptic teenager.

More thoughts as they come-I’ll give it a test run tomorrow morning.

Update 4.25: I played with it for a while yesterday, and while it’s fast, and clean, it didn’t light my fire as much as I was hoping. I think this is due partially because I’m entering the middle of a project as opposed to starting a new one with it; it’s got a lot of nice features that I could use, but I’ve not had enough time to really find them all yet.

Daffodil

Finally, some warm weather. It’s going to be 70° this weekend, and I have work-work to do inside, when I’d rather be outside with a rake and shovel. Argghh!

Bill’s Laptop Barn, Part Two

I’m beginning to see now why the $300 Powerbook was $300. When I first picked it up, the screen was fine, but I noticed some play in the hinge clutch—not anything to worry about, I figured, because Jen’s Pismo had an equal amount of play and it’s always been fine. (I also noted that the case on this G4 has been opened at least once, because there are two screws missing on the right side in the display and by the video port.)

Over the course of the last few days I’ve been getting more and more artifacting on the lower half of the screen. At first I was able to get rid of it by altering the LCD display angle, but now it’s to the point where the lower half stays black and no amount of adjustment will get rid of it.

Doing some sleuthing, I found some excellent sites with detailed instructions on disassembly and part swapping for everything from the display to the DC board, which makes mucking about inside the guts that much easier. (I’ve had my old Pismo down to the motherboard without directions before, and it was a dicey affair, but I did it.)

I’m assuming I’ll at least need to replace the video cable, and while I’ve got the case cracked I want to swap out the DC board to repair the damage done by the previous owner. Because the display hinge has some play in it (and I’d guess this is the root of the video problem) and because I already have to pull the display off to get to the DC board, I might as well see if I can replace the clutch hinges on both sides.

I figure about $200 plus an afternoon of surgery should get us a production/backup laptop in fighting shape and ready for action.

Meanwhile, my $40 Powerbook 1400 is still being flaky when it comes to wireless connectivity. I can get a couple of minutes of pure signal (or hours, on occasion) but then the connection will drop and I’m offline. Restarting, reseating the wireless card, and cursing have no effect. I even pulled an identical wireless card from my spare Base Station and tried that, but had no luck with a constant signal.

Update 4/21: I cracked the G4 case last night, and came away with mixed results. The case itself is full of dust and grit—it’s a miracle the thing hasn’t shorted out already, honestly. There are more than a few case screws missing, and the hard drive is a Samsung notebook drive, not the Apple original, confirming my suspicion that someone’s been in here before. As much as I don’t want to pull the rest of it apart, I’m going to order the DC board and replace that before I put the whole thing back together.

I cracked the upper bezel this morning, and it looks like the clutch assemblies are in fine shape, but the screws that held them to the display frame were exceptionally loose. I think I’m going to reattach the display to the case and see if the display flicker problem is gone, but I’ll still buy the monitor cable just in case.

a previous installment of Bill’s laptop barn

LEGO Millenium Falcon

The $500 LEGO Millenium Falcon. As a Star Wars geek, LEGO geek, and 36 year old American male, I don’t know whether to charge this to my credit card IMMEDIATELY or run screaming from the computer. (I don’t want to be that guy with two kids, a mortgage, and my Star Wars figures on display.) If I was 13 again, however, I’d start the daily Christmas pestering reminders right now.

A look back at the NC2000

Here’s an article looking back at the first generation of professional digital cameras aimed at photojournalists. It’s amazing to think of how different the playing field would be today if Kodak had made an effort to go digital sooner. $17,950 for 1.3 Megapixels…damn.

Recap

There’s been a lot of silence around here lately. I’ve been putting stuff up in the sidebar, but the main feed here has been quiet due to a hectic schedule and the winter blahs. I’ll recap the highlights:

The storm that kicked the crap out of New England blew through here with a vengeance, but did no lasting damage to the Lockardugan compound. I thought for sure that I’d wake to find the greenhouse impaled by a large branch from the sugar maple in the backyard, but it’s still standing. The blue house across the street did not fare so well, though—a century-old tree of unknown species gave up at the root ball and fell over into the empty side yard. A neighbor further down the street lost a pine tree which fell directly into his front porch, and as of yesterday afternoon the chippers made short work of it. Between some ill-advised elective pruning and this week’s storm, that side of the street is looking much thinner this year.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been playing follow-the-bouncing-ball with the city over our water situation. We’ve been having problems with our water for years now: it goes from almost clear to disgustingly rusty in weekly cycles, with no real rhyme or reason, and it’s ruined much of our whitest laundry. I spent time on the phone with DPW, who claim they came out and cleared the hydrants, and the city labs (who are supposedly tasked with testing the water), who gave me multiple numbers to call in a futile search for someone who could help. I gave up on the city, and yesterday morning we had a pair of plumbers in to install a commercial filter just inside the basement wall. Our plumbers are true Baltimoreans, in that they have the honest accent I can only mimic, and they always appear in a cloud of cigarette smoke, but they are knowledgeable, quick, and the nicest contractors I think I’ve ever dealt with. While they were here I had them quote on moving one of the radiators back into the dining room, and when we get a little money in the door I’ll have them come back and do it in preparation for next winter.

Jen and I have been searching for floor coverings ever since we got in this house, and as anyone who has looked at rugs can relate, it’s an expensive proposition. For a premade rug to mostly fit one of our bedrooms (most rugs come 6′ x 9′ or 8′ x 10′, and our bedrooms are all 12′ x 12′) we’d be paying over a grand for something that kind of looked good. Our good friends R&K hipped us to buying carpet remnants and having the edges bound, and it felt like the scene in The Miracle Worker where Helen Keller finally gets it. We drove out to Security to one of the local carpet dealers’ warehouses and shlepped through forests of carpet rolls, holding this paint chip up against that color and marveling at some of the deep-discount patterns that reminded us of decades past. We settled on one color and pattern for our bedroom, but didn’t have luck with the other rooms despite the selection.

For the rock-bottom price of $300, I scored an Aluminum G4 PowerBook from Craigslist last night for Jen to use as a travel laptop. It’s 15″ and been used pretty well (the power cord is a little flaky due to a drop, which may prompt the purchase of a replacement power board off eBay) but the screen is bright, everything works, and it came with a nice Brenthaven laptop backpack, which usually retails for over $100. I’d say we made out very well.

Finally, I’m frantically trying to fit in as much illustration as I can before May 3rd, which is the submission deadline for page layouts in the book I’ll be advertising in. I have two images that I’ve settled on, but I need at least two more to feel comfortable, and I don’t have them yet. For now, I’m working late in the evening trying to balance paying work and illustration so that I can hit all the deadlines…cross your fingers for me.

101 Essential Freelancing Resources

101 Essential Freelancing Resources. Some of these are so-so, some are stupid, and some are very smart.

A Present For My Lady

This afternoon I won an auction for a galette iron to give my bride, after waiting around for months to see one pop up. This one is a model G-1 (petit), which means it’s not as big as the family iron, but I figure it’s worth a shot for $9.

I’m keeping my eye out for the large version, to be sure.

Life-Size Car model

A car club got together and made a life-size model out of a 1940 Ford, down to the little jars of paint, the box, and an X-acto knife. Genius. (via)

…and my right arm, too.

Some quick price checking on the Adobe Creative Suite for both Jen and I leads to a sobering realization: In order to get the components I need (Photoshop, Illustrator) in CS3, I’ll have to spend $1,583 on the Web Premium edition. Strangely, the Web Standard edition doesn’t come with Photoshop or Illustrator, which I’d compare to selling a new car without an engine or tires.

However, she can get the Design Standard edition for $1,187 with everything she’d need to work—the Design Premium edition includes Flash and Dreamweaver. This is like selling a car with an optional jacuzzi tub and heated sunporch—sure, they’re nice, but do they really go with the base product?

Name That Crazy

Any guesses?

DasBoot

Make a bootable removable drive (iPod, Flash drive, etc.) out of any Mac diagnostic CD with DasBoot. (via)

17″ MacBook Pro battery woes

Wow, Engadget has a whole lot of links about problems with 17″ MacBook Pro batteries warping, expanding, and generally going kaput. Knowing just how hot this thing gets, I can’t say I’m shocked, but…

English Car