So Long Judas

Posted on 03/21/2004 by

Jesus Christ Superstar, the DVD and soundtrack, get regular play in our household. Kelly and Mary Claire can sing many of the lyrics. We were trying to figure out the haunting words sung by the chorus at the end of Judas’ Death.

We found them: So Long Judas. Poor old Judas.

Carl Anderson was the amazing singer/actor who played Judas in the movie. He also played the role on broadway. Looking for more about him, I found he died on February 24th this year of leukemia. This is a good bio on Carl Anderson.

iStockPhoto.com

Posted on 03/18/2004 by

iStockphoto.com is a royalty-free photo site. For 50 cents, members can download photographs and use them in any way they want.

I’ve used the more expensive Corbis.com for projects at work and spent $25 per photo. I’ll try iStockphoto first next time.

iBook Not Finding DNS

Posted on 03/15/2004 by

Kathy’s iBook quit finding things on the internet. For some reason it did not know how to locate DNS (our nearest internet phone book.) The wireless router is supposed to tell the iBook where DNS is located.

She thought she had lost internet access, but this would work:

http://216.109.118.79 (Yahoo’s IP address)

when this would not:

http://www.yahoo.com

I manually set the i.p. addresses for our two nearest DNS servers:

~~4.21.254.24~~ 4.21.254.2 (dns1.netcentrix.net)

~~4.21.254.25~~ 4.21.254.3 (dns2.netcentrix.net)

in the Network system preference.

Off-Line Blogging

Posted on 03/03/2004 by

Many people use off-line blogging tools like w.bloggar (Windows) or Kung-Log (Mac) to compose articles. It can make a number of steps easier like adding links, doing spell checking, formatting text, and adding images.

Safari now has built in spell checking, so we at Stonegate tend to just use that. However, it means we have to learn how to build links and bolds by hand, since the little link/bold shortcuts are only available in Explorer for Windows (as in the snapshot below.)

Movable Style

Posted on 03/01/2004 by

The site Movable Style is dedicated to showing off different style templates for Movable Type. Change the “Styles” drop down menu to instantly change the look of the site.

You can download the style sheets and put them in your own blog. If you want to change your blog to one of these looks, let me know.

When you log into MovableType there is a help button at the top that explains how many things work.

Kelly went in and changed a lot of the colors in her style sheet. I helped her clean up her changes, so her blog is unique looking. I think she did a good job.

This article explains how your Main Index template is made and how your style sheet controls the look.

FireFox

Posted on 02/15/2004 by

Ever since Apple delivered Safari, a thin, fast browser, I’ve been a fan. I found an equivalent on the Windows side in Firebird, a development project by the Mozilla team. Firebird was a temporary name, but it has become so popular, the final brand name is similar: Firefox.

An article on creating the logo and icon:

// hicksdesign :: branding firefox

R.I.P. = Read In Peace

Posted on 02/14/2004 by

I do most of my reading (like Greg) on the internet. When Yahoo News started animating their ads so that some of them crawled right across the columns of text, I went looking for a way to block it.

On the Windows side, I’ve used PopUpCop for years. It blocks Pop Up ads, animated banners, and all kinds of tricky script things that run in the background trying to track you, advertise to you, etc. I don’t mind passive banner ads (as print ads are) but all of the animation and tracking is too much.

On Apple’s Safari browser (Internet Explorer did not even ship with our new Mac) I found a blog on Hicks Design pointing to Pith Helmet, which immediately put annoying ads to rest.

Google’s pop-up blocker does not stop animated ads. I doubt Internet Explorer’s new pop-up blocker will either, so I’ll keep using PopUpCop and Pith Helmet.

iMac 17 Entry

Posted on 02/10/2004 by

iMac 17 arrived at work via FedEx Ground (Home) delivery. This was the default, cheapest shipping method. They attempted to deliver on Saturday night at work. “Business Closed.” Attempted again Monday night. I called FedEx and asked them to tell the driver 8 am to 5 pm please.

Danny had the new Mac with OS X Panther set up in no time. He and Kelly started playing with Garage Band.

The ApplePro Speakers sound every bit as good as the Harman/Kardon Speaker Sticks + iSub. The 17″ screen is terrific, floating in the computer armoire.

Software Update ran automatically and updated various apps. Had to download iSynch 1.3 from .Mac to get Safari Bookmarks, Address Book, and Calendar synched.

Easy but big data transfer efforts: Copy over iPhoto Library and let iPhoto 4 upgrade them from 3 format. Copy iTunes Library.

Specs.