Fnord.

Click on the images for more pictures… this is a mineral carrier in Cyclone George off Australia.

Supercool.

There’s been a bit of a mini-fad of late on the internet of programs that create a full-screen window with text only, very much like the bad old days of 80×25 phospor. I think it started with Dark Room, but I could be wrong. There are several others.

The idea has some merit, but for the coding and hacking I do the closest thing I’ve found is a Linux console: There, you have eight terminals instantly switchable with alt-Fn. My home server never runs X for this very reason; I have enough superfast terminal windows for anything I want to do.

The latest release of the FOSS iTerm adds this capability to my Mac. By hitting apple-enter, you enter or leave full-screen mode. Apple-T still gives a new (also full-screen) terminal, and most importantly I can switch between them with apple-number (e.g. apple-1). I had tried iTerm a few times before and hadn’t liked it due to some lagginess on keyboard, that’s also now fixed and I’ve stopped using Terminal.

(For me, that’s a huge thing. Really.)

Fast. No distractions, works well, is free. Highly recommended.

OK children, compare the following. From my posting:

For many years now, Seiko has sold a line of mechanical dive watches based on the trusty 7S26 movement (the heart of the watch). They retail for under $200, they are well made and reliable, and they are generally considered to be excellent “beaters”.

The problem is that the 7S26 movement is burdened with a couple of design compromises: you can’t wind it by hand, and it is a non-hacking movement, which means that when you pull the stem out all the way, the movement doesn’t stop as you might expect (making it very difficult to set the watch with much accuracy). Of course, Seiko sells several other watches with better movements, but they cost more.

As of April 2007, that’s about to change. Seiko is introducing three new divers based on the 6R15 movement which is more accurate, can be wound by hand, and can be hacked. With stainless steel cases, they come in black (SBDC001), blue (SBDC003), and orange (SBDC005), and will be priced at $428 (63,000 yen). If you want to get an early start, all three watches can be pre-ordered from Seiya.

and now from this page:

And for many years now, Seiko has been selling a line of mechanical dive watches based on the 7S26 automatic movement. And for April 2007, Seiko is introducing three new divers based on the 6R15 movement which is more accurate, and has a hacking adjustment and is hand-windable.
…
With stainless steel cases these new divers comes in three colors i.e. black (SBDC001), blue (SBDC003) and you’ll surely love orange (SBDC005).

These watches are bit costly, it will cost you $428 (63, 000yen). And it’s a nice BIG one too, at 45mm without the crown.

And then credit Seiya as a source. Ahh well, I guess it’s flattery, eh? They did reorder the words a fair bit.

Oh yeah, the title of this posting refers to the previous note.

My first byline is up!

Supercool.

OK, based on this blog post I decided to check out Twitter.

Kind of an RSS feed for your (nerdier) friends. Signed up, no problems. (Username is phubbard)

Next up, an easier way to get and send updates. For sending updates, install and use the Applescript+Quicksilver from this page. That allows superfast updates with no client software.

(For the blackberry, I just added twitter@twitter.com to my Google IM list, so I can use the IM program. Or SMS. Both pretty easy.)

After that, I want to use Growl for others’ updates. (I’m also gonna try RSS, depending on how it goes.) Haven’t got this up yet, but here are some links I’m reading:

1. One program
2. Another
3. Another, also claims QS

See also this excellent page on the several habits of highly effective Twitter users.

Dunno how useful Twitter is or will be, but I’m entertained for now. Might also put my latest status on the blog, for example. Feel free to add me or post a comment on how you use it.

As of today or so, I’ll be doing side work for Watch Report, where I’ll be doing news and reviews. I’m super excited about this - I get paid a very small amount to review watches! And I don’t have to buy them!

Sweet. I’ll post a link to my byline once its available.

A quick test of the automation, seems to work!

Hmm. Maybe I should tweak it to upload the full-size image and save its URL as well. Hmm.

The problem:

Given a random JPEG, scale it to 400 pixels wide (this is what seems to fit on this blog), append an extension, upload it to the website, and put the complete URL into the clipboard for subsequent posting.

The solution:

Automator for doing the image operations and filename appending, followed by two zsh scripts for iteration, upload, file movement and such.

wp-iterator.zsh:

#!/bin/zsh
# Loop over image files, upload each.
# pfh 3/4/07

cd /Users/hubbard/Desktop/Wordpress

foreach f in *-wp.jpg
 #echo $f
 $HOME/bin/wp-upload.zsh $f
 if [[  $? == 0 ]]; then
   mv $f Posted
 else
   echo $? : Error uploading $f: leaving it in place!
 fi
end

…which invokes wp-upload.zsh:

#!/bin/zsh
# Script to upload a blog pic and paste its url into the clipboard
# pfh 3/4/07

scp -q $1 USERNAME@WEBHOST:/export/website/wp-pics
echo http://www.phfactor.net/wp-pics/$1 | pbcopy
pbpaste

(URL and username removed for spam reasons)

I then have a wrapper Automator scrip that just invokes the ‘copy-scale-rename’ script and then the wp-iterator.zsh script. URLs are pasted into the clipboard, which works for more than one file because I run Jumpcut.

A successful run looks like this:

./wp-iterator.zsh
http://www.phfactor.net/wp-pics/img_1961-bb-wp.jpg

Also required: An ssh agent, I use sshkeychain. Otherwise, it’ll ask for your password each time.

When done, I dragged the wrapper Automator program to the toolbar, where I can just drop images. Seems to work!

As I said on the SCWF, I was experimenting with a small tripod and a piece of paper as a light reflector. The first one came out better, shows the dial pretty close to how it normally looks. The reflective indices and hands are hard to photograph; I think this is decent.

Click on either for an 800×600 version.

From a thread on WPS:

…like hairy chested, open silk shirted, heavily jewelried disco danny’s doing the Rolex Drape over their Porsche 911 steering wheel at the corner of Wilshire and Santa Monica.