The main way I get all of my news updates is through RSS. I use the most-excellent Growl notification application to let me know whenever a new post comes in, and I make it a point of clearing out my feeds every day. With around 50 blog subscriptions, this can take a bit of time, but it is a great way to unwind at the end of the day.
Up until this weekend, I had been using a fantastic piece of open source freeware, Vienna, as my RSS reader. It can be configured to have a column-based browse interface, which I find the most effective, and has an elegant and light-weight user interface. Also, there is an integrated browser, which means you don’t have to leave the app to diver deeper into a post. However, as the number of blog subscriptions I read has continued to grow, Vienna has started to choke. The app began to consistently freeze up when trying to refresh the feeds, and this sometimes would cause open browser tab to be lost when the app restarted after crashing. I finally got fed up with the problem and decided to find another reader.
Luckily NewsGator has made their RSS reader, NetNewsWire, available as a free download. This app can be configured to run in a similar way as Vienna, and offers the added benefit of being able to sync your subscriptions across machines through an online account. In order to get my subscriptions out of Vienna and into NetNewsWire, I just exported the OPML file from Vienna to my desktop and then imported into NetNewsWire. My one piece of advice here would be to make sure you have read all the posts in your old reader, since OPML doesn’t preserve read/unread.
Getting into the swing of things with NetNewsWire has been a painless process. It isn’t plagued by the slowdown or crashing problems like Vienna was. The one problem is that the shortest automated refresh interval you can set is 30 minutes, which is a bit long for me. You can still refresh manually, and that is a small price to pay for stability. Plus, I dig that there is an iPhone interface through NewsGator.
So, while I am sad that I can’t be supporting open source through using Vienna, I am quite happy with NetNewsWire, but will check back in with my old friend from time to time in the hope that maybe things have changed for the better.
Sorry Eva fans, there is no secret governmental organization working to protect Tokyo-3. Instead, NERV is Cisco’s “Networked Emergency Response Vehicle.” This specialized vehicle serves as a mobile command center to aide during disaster relief.
I have been in the market for an ultra-portable laptop that would serve as a lightweight travel companion and coffee shop buddy. I am a rabid Apple fanboy, but while the Macbook Air is incredibly lightweight, its footprint is no smaller than many other notebooks. Also, it lacks built-in mobile broadband, and has a glossy screen which provides a high degree of glare and has over-saturated colors.
So, since Apple can’t give me what I need, I have been on the prowl for another UMPC. Luckily, the success of Asus’ EEE PC has spawned a host of competitors. Recently, I had my hopes pinned on HP’s 2133 Mini-Note. The specs were right (bluetooth, 6 cell battery, 1.6 GHz Via processor) and the size seemed perfect. I was all set to time the purchase with the latest Ubuntu release (8.04) and get myself a perfect road warrior machine.
The laptop was finally officially announced last night, and within minutes of reading the initial reviews, my dreams were dashed. It turns out that the Mini-Note doesn’t just have a reflective screen, but it actually has a full glossy surface on top of the display to offer protection (click here for the review). While this might be a good feature for the educational market they are targeting, it is a deal-breaker for me.
So, now I am back where I started. I need a lightweight laptop that has a matte screen, bluetooth, preferably mobile broadband, and enough juice to get me from LA to DC. My only hope is that the next round of UMPC’s heed my call. Otherwise, off to Dynamism I go.
Here is a fascinating article about a ban by Bowling Green State University on Nerf guns. Live Action Role-Playing, or LARPing, is a sub-genre of of RPG’s that takes gameplay into the real world. At Bowling Green, students began a game of “Undead”, which is a flavor of the LARP “Humans vs. Zombies”. The game involves two teams, the Zombies and the Humans, and the goal is for the humans to evade being “bitten” by the zombies. The humans can fight of the horde of undead by defending themselves with Nerf guns, among other weapons.
Apparently, the LARPers started causing a commotion and disrupting campus, and so the administration cracked down and forbade the player from using the great foam defense. They were allowed to fight of the zombies with socks and marshmallows, but this limitation still upset the participants. This has caused a bit of controversy on campus, and the LARPers are rallying to get their weapons back. The story continues with more interesting twists, including a relative who worked at Nerf coming to pay a visit to campus.
I am very interested in the phenomena of LARPing and Alternate Reality Gaming (ARG’s), and so, as these forms of entertainment become more pervasive, I am sure there will be more conflicts as we see play continue to spill over into the real world.
So on Sunday I went to celebrate Easter at my friends’, Steve and Kristin’s, house. While it for some reason involved an unusual amount of sombrero wearing, it also brought that standard excellent food, candy, and fun. In addition, they gave me my birthday present (we celebrated the week before; I was born on the “Ides of March”). Kristin made this most awesome throwback piece for me, and I was giddy when I got it. Now to find the wall space…
If you just upgraded to Safari 3.1, you may have noticed that the Yahoo! Media Player is crashing the browser. This is due to a change in the latest version of Safari, and is being addressed and should be fixed ASAP (EDIT: this problem was fixed and pushed to the stable build as Wednesday afternoon, 3/19).
In the meantime, if you try to deactivate the current plugin (v0.3), you may encounter a problem. This is a non-fatal error, and your admin panel should return to normal through just hitting the “back” button on your browser. However, I have found and corrected the bug, so please download and install the new version.
Every Monday I volunteer at 826LA to help kids with their homework and independent writing projects. Last week, the person I was tutoring finished all of his homework, and so we perused the book collection looking for something fun. He settled on a “Where’s Waldo?” book, and so we got to work putting our sleuthing skills to the test.
I had forgotten how much I had loved these books growing up, and so in my quest to get back in touch with my inner Waldo, found a site that has embedded a Nintendo emulator (thanks to Java) to play the NES Waldo game. Enjoy!
So for you other LA folks, I am sure you have seen “The Rental Man”, the guy dressed up in a superhero costume who dances to help promote “Westside Rentals”. Well, I just received an interesting piece of spam from the company informing me that they are holding auditions to find the next “Rental Man”. Here’s the skinny:
What: Rental Man Open Audition When: Friday, March 14, 2008 @ 2pm Where: Westside Rentals HQ (1020 Wilshire Blvd, Santa Monica, CA 90401) Who: You! Why: $60,000 a year plus all expenses paid for great seats at Lakers, Clippers, Kings, Ducks, Dodgers, Angels, UCLA, USC and THE SUPER BOWL!!!!!
See you on Friday!
I had no idea it paid so well! Guess that furious dancing comes with some serious benefits. If you are intrigued, you can find more at:
If you haven’t noticed, there is a music player integrated into this site. It creates those small play buttons next to each mp3 links (such as for this incredibly amazing song), and also creates the player in the bottom-left corner of the screen. If you want to see a richer demo, play with my music posts category. This player is a free piece of software available courtesy of Yahoo!. While they have already done an excellent job of making the player easy to integrate into a site, I decided to test my coding chops and make a plugin for the Wordpress blogging platform (the one that this site uses) to make it even easier to install and manage.
I recently had some free time to work on the plugin, and it now is up to version 0.3. I have completely rewritten the plugin, and added some functionality. There is now an “options” pane that will allow you to turn on the “beta” build of the player, so to speak, so you can test the new features coming down the pipe.
Also, I must disclose that while I am a Yahoo! employee, I work on this in my free time since I love the utility, am a big music fan, and needed a cool coding project. Please play around with this latest version and pass along any feedback.
Brightkite
del.icio.us
Digg
Dopplr
Flickr
Last FM
LinkedIn
Pandora
Pownce
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Tumblr
Twitter
Upcoming
Vimeo
Yelp
YouTube
