Gallery Installed on Mac5

Posted on 07/15/2007 by

Installed Gallery 2.2 on Mac5. It is different software than MovableType (our blogging software) so it requires a separate login (on main Gallery page.)

There is a link to the main page at the top-right of Mac5. And then I put links to specific albums using the word “Photos” next to the blog summaries. It takes a bit to get used to. Mom and I experimented tonight, and she was able to get some Las Vegas photos uploaded.

Quick Directions:

1. Put several photos in a folder on your desktop. When exporting them from your photo editor, choose a maximum width of 1000 pixels. The goal is to keep each photo under 2 MB.

2. Login (on main Gallery page.) Your album will hold albums. (And those albums will hold photos.)

4. Create a new album and name the directory without spaces: Ex: LasVegas2007

5. The title of the album can have spaces. Ex: Las Vegas 2007

6. Choose “Add items”.

7. Use the “Upload Applet” and answer “yes” about trusting it.

8. Drag the folder from your desktop created in step 1 into the empty Upload List window. The Upload List will fill up with a list of your photos.

9. Click on the “Upload” button and go have some coffee.

Once uploaded, you can rename your photos, add comments, and rearrange them.

Buy the Album “Alice” by Tom Waits

Posted on 07/09/2007 by

(I’m testing my new iTunes affiliates account where I get commission if I recommend music. So don’t really buy this album, unless you like Tom Waits. I have this one and it is one of my favorites.)

Buy music through iTunes? Click here:

VW Passat Log

Posted on 07/04/2007 by

Google docs lets you create word documents, spreadsheets, and now charts and presentations using only a browser. You need a Google account (as in a gmail account.) I use it to keep a record of the bills I pay each month (so I have confirmation numbers, dates, amounts.) The two advantages are:

1) I can pay bills from any computer and record my transactions each month, and

2) the copy/paste of the transaction confirmations works better than copy/paste into a regular spreadsheet or word processor. (I guess because Google docs are web based.)

I decided to keep a log of my VW transactions including gas, maintenance, etc. Using Google docs. You have the option to publish the documents and / or share them with other Google account users, even allowing them to edit. The link here is to a read-only page: Link to VW Log.

Website Looks A Little Sparse

Posted on 06/30/2007 by

Our new pastor, Msgr David, sent me an e-mail saying the website “looked a little sparse.” I suspected it was an older browser issue, so I went looking for a website that would take snapshots of www.sjnlilburn.com in different browser versions. I had done this in the past, but I’m amazed at how the tools have evolved. I used two sites. Browsershots.org (free) and one is BrowserCam.com (free 24 hours trial.) The latter is really good and worth the trouble to sign up for a free trial. I used a bloglines disposable e-mail address to register, in case I want to sign up again.

It turns out Internet Explorer versions 4, 5, 5.5, and 6 were all suffering from a stylesheet box problem that, through some trial and error, I was able to repair.

These are some of the many snapshots BrowserCam generated for me. (I could zoom into each one.) The second shows the sparse problem.

The code fix was associated with a technique to trick IE 5.0 / 5.5 / 6.


#left_menu  {
width: 155px;
voice-family: "\"}\"";
voice-family:inherit;
width: 155px;
}
/* CSS1 UAs should see and use 2nd width */
html>body #left_menu { width: 160px }

Well-behaved browsers end up picking up the 160px width. IE 5 and 6 pick up the first 155. 5.5 picks up the second 155.

The numbers are backwards, though, because the 160 should be a smaller number than 155 not larger, so there is probably something else going on. I’m just happy the site is no longer sparse.

Battle At The Watering Hole

Posted on 06/30/2007 by

What chance does a calf have when caught by a pride of lions and a pair of crocodiles? Doesn’t seem very good…

Quote at end: “You could sell this video.” Thanks to Scot.

iMac 17 Flat Panel

Posted on 06/23/2007 by

Acquired Feb 10 2004:

Machine Name: iMac
Machine Model: PowerMac6,3
CPU Type: PowerPC G4 (3.3)
Number Of CPUs: 1
CPU Speed: 1.25 GHz
L2 Cache (per CPU): 256 KB
Memory: 512 MB
Bus Speed: 167 MHz
Boot ROM Version: 4.7.8f1
Serial Number: QP40601BQB8

Exploded diagram shows Airport Extreme (which is what I’m looking for today.)

Claire’s 10th Tune & DSL Speedtest

Posted on 06/23/2007 by

Claire got straight A’s again earning another 10 songs off iTunes.She could only come up with 9 a few weeks ago, but this morning she announced she had decided on her 10th tune– Radio Killed The Video Star by the Buggles (1979.)

Bellsouth fixed something in May that cured some outage problems. Since then DSL has been reliable and zippy. In fact, I was surprised how quickly the 4 megabyte Video Killed song came down, so I did another speed test. The 1.22 Mbps download is a bit faster than all previous tests, so I think it all comes down to Bellsouth getting something squared away that hasn’t been square for about a year. Uploads are much slower, but that is expected.

Download Statistics 1.04 MB

——————————————————————

Best Speed = 1.22 Mbps, Average speed = 1.22 Mbps

Worst Speed = 1.22 Mbps, Average time taken = 7.14 secs

Upload Statistics 1.04 MB

——————————————————————

Best Speed = 0.21 Mbps, Average speed = 0.21 Mbps

Worst Speed = 0.21 Mbps, Average time taken = 40.57 secs

Slow Comments Fixed: blitzed.org

Posted on 06/02/2007 by editor

I noticed that posting comments was taking 15 to 20 seconds. I typed “movabletype comment posting delay” in Google and found this article with these instructions about an anti-spam service, blitzed.org, that has gone out of business. The comment posting routine was trying to contact the defunct service and check to see if the poster was coming from a “blacklisted” spam source. It would give up after 15 to 20 seconds.

Fix instructions:

1. Login to Movable Type. (Your account will need to have System Administrator privileges.)

2. Click on the “Plugins” link in the main navigation on the left hand side.

3. Look for the “SpamLookup – Lookups” plugin set listed among your other plugins.

4. Click “Show Settings.”

5. Under “IP Blacklist Services” highlight and replace the text “opm.blitzed.org” with “zen.spamhaus.org”.

6. Click “Save Settings.”

Comment posting much quicker now! I think this formal kind of support is an advantage of using MovableType

Snap Shots (web page preview)

Posted on 05/31/2007 by

I’ve added some code to my blogs from Snap.com that creates “Snap Shots” for external links. I tend to reference other places on the web, so any external link will now feature a little balloon (indicated by red arrow below.) If you float your mouse over the external link, you get a quick preview of the web page. With links to Wikipedia, Snap Shots goes one step further and makes the text very readable. For example, float over this link to Five Forks, Georgia.

In the example below, I’m floating my mouse over a link to an Apple ad, and you can quickly tell which ad it is… the one with the “Mac Genius.”

Ted should probably add Snap Shots to his blog since he does external links.

How To Scan: ScanMaker X6

Posted on 05/26/2007 by

We have an old scanner that still works just fine, although the software that worked in Windows 95 does not work in Windows 2000. But the drivers work with other software that can import from a scanner like Paintshop Pro. Steps:

1. Turn on scanner (hooked up via USB) and put photo / document face down.

2. On Dell, start up Jasc Paintshop Pro.

3. Choose File… Import… TWAIN… Acquire

4. For photos or documents, I typically choose color and 150 dpi

5. Use the preview button to do a quick scan

6. Adjust the outline to only the part you need (photo, article, check, etc.)

7. Press the Scan button, and the image will be brought into a new Paintshop Pro document ready for scaling, adjusting, and saving (typically as a JPG.)

8. Turn off scanner.

Here I’m scanning the check we got for the Jeep Wrangler. There is a photo of Ted at sunset in Thailand on the scanner for some reason.