obive.net

Imagine a classroom with twenty students in it. Each student has three pages of paper. Each piece of paper has four hundred names on each side. Each name represents a family of four. Let?s say each person in all of these families has completed five thousand math problems in their lifetime, on average (that?s one hundred ninety two thousand people). Imagine the complexity of each of these math problems was quite simple, ether addition, multiplication, division, or subtraction using numbers of nine orders of magnitude such as 294,967,296. The average computer could complete every single math problem every person in every single family named on these three pieces of paper on each one of these twenty students desks in their lifetime in one second. Assuming five thousand problems in one life time we can calculate that the computer I am talking about can do one billion thirty-two bit operations per second, much like your standard P4 or Athlon.

Computers are really powerful things! In addition to calculations, they can transfer what equates to the contents of a single book shelf to a hard disk, or the entire contents of ten full encyclopedias (including images) through memory in the time it takes to flip to the next page. What can all this power achieve? Let?s take a trip to the airport to find out? (next page)

Our hosting company has apparently upgraded the server and failed to notify us of any of these changes. The results:

• IP address of server changed, affecting cybercoment.com, edhayes.us, obive.net, and subsequent sub domains.
• Disk space quotas were really screwed up so I couldn?t upload or change anything until that was taken care of.
• I wasted hours troubleshooting all of this when a simple ?hey, were upgrading the server and your IP address is going to change? e-mail would have solved all of this. I also sent them repeated ?fix it? help requests.

So there you have it, the explanation of why cybercoment.com was down? YEAH! It might take a while for DNS things to propagate? How fantastic!

On a side note, I?ve worked on CEInfoBar quite a bit today. The iTunes bar now does ratings and all sorts of cool fancy things. WHAT EXCITING NEWS!

Update:

I just learned that this was an emergency upgrade. One of the hard disks was close to failing in the first server.

Section 1: Windows Media Player

I sent the following to Microsoft via their online feedback form:

I am surprised how poorly designed Windows Media Player is. With each new release (since version seven to eight) I have been expecting all the interface and ease of use problems to be fixed or at least somewhat dealt with. But what happens is it gets worse and worse. Media Player integrated with Windows the way Microsoft thinks the user wants it to, however there are no options to disable this integration. Instead of integrating like all other media players have in the past, Microsoft created a new method of integration JUST FOR MEDIA PLAYER. So when you go into the registry (since there is no option) to remove this integration: surprise! It’s not where you expect it to be. The ONLY explanation for adding this new undocumented and unwarranted change in behavior is to prevent people from disabling it, which is INSANE. So starting with the immediate hatred toward media player 7, and then being disappointed with 8, then 9, and now 10, you SERIOSLY need to do some usage studies and make Windows Media Player at least usable. When (for whatever reason) something starts playing in Media Player because of some crazy integration technique, I sigh, swear at the computer for displaying that horrible program on MY screen, immediately close it, and hope to god it hasn’t once again re-integrated itself. Is this what you were going for when you created this program? It's not like I don’t like it because it’s not perfect, I don’t like it because it’s so amazingly poorly designed. I am most definitely proficient with computers, so how you expect computer illiterate people to use (and like) this junk software must ether be beyond my comprehension or you actually don’t expect this. For God's sake, make Windows Media Player better… PLEASE!!!

I hope you at least laughed once, and then came to the realization that I make a really good point.

Section 2: Cool People

What on Earth persuades people like this to put an UN-LIT cigarette in their mouth for a picture to be displayed to millions of people on the internet? This is not a rhetorical question. I really want to know.

Section 3: Windows Installer

Why the Windows Installer so great (this includes Wise and Install Shield for Windows Installer)? Well because when it creates new program groups in windows and places shortcuts to “programs” what its actual doing is this:

• Creates folder in Start Menu “<ProgramName>”
• Creates folder in some crazy directory “<WindowsDir>/Installer/<SomeGUID>”
• Installs some registry keys mapping the GUID to an actual program in the installed directory “<ProgramFiles>/<ProgramName>/<ProgramName>.exe
• Installs a “stub” program in the folder it created in step 2 with a name of “Icon<First8HexDigitsOfGUID>.exe”. Some how this program maps to the actual program through the GUID installed into the registry.
• This stub program has “PAPADDINGXXPADDING” repeated in it to fill up space…

Why is this so great? Because when you want to get to the installed folder, you can just open up the start menu group, right click, and use the Microsoft Windows 95 PowerToy Target menu to open it up. Oh wait, no, this opens up that damn installer folder with the GUID and the stub program. Since this stub program isn’t a shortcut to the actual program, you can’t target menu it. HOW FANTASTIC! This is obviously well designed.

Section 4: Windows Clipboard

While taking the screen shot for the installer, I had some trouble. I hit the normal print screen button, and the cursor changed for a second, so I presume it copied into memory. I open up Corel PhotoPaint to crop it. I click File > New From Clipboard like I usually do, but nothing happens. I assume I didn’t click the right thing and try again. Again, nothing. At this point I’m assuming that there’s some dumb bug in PhotoPaint so I try to open good old MSPaint. I hit paste, and WOW! Clipboard data is bad. What’s up with that? I look up at CEInfoBar and the memory indicator is yellow which means physical memory is between 80 and 90 percent full. Ok, great. So I close my BitTorrent client memory hog, and Warcraft 3, and such… At this point I have about 50 percent physical memory free with just a few little programs open (apparently 512MB is needed to hold them though). I try to paste again, and still an error. I close paint and reopen it, still not working. By now I’m crying. What the hell could be preventing this paste?? I had had it by now, so I restarted and then I

Section 5: Misc Bits

Well I've completed 1 week (4 days last week and 1 this week) of the semester. The professors this semester are a LOT better than last, well, except for my Calc professor last semester, he was awesome. No more Durand Durand!! WOOO!!! (This is where you cheer with me.)

I hooked up my new monitor to my PC so now its dual, which is kind of weird. I hear all these people blabbing "OMG! Dual is so great! I can't even use single display now that I’m used to dual!" Well, I think that’s bull shit. It’s a total pain in the ass to go back and forth. About the only nice thing is that I can be in Warcraft while Ventrilo and iTunes are on the other screen so I can see who’s spamming the stupid music or sounds and also see if the current song playing is rated, and if not, is it worth alt-tabbing to minimize Warcraft and then change the rating. Obviously it shouldn’t just give iTunes focus on the other monitor; it should minimize and then take 3 seconds to get its bearings. That way, when I alt tab to rate something, my hero doesn't Die in DotA. I guess that’s better than what Mac does; it just blanks the other screen. At least is sexy when it blanks it, and it fades and such. Windows would just flash it and then it would flikker and then the monitor would explode.

Speaking of Mac vs. PC, Anand Lal Shimpi has put up a review about his PowerBook (same configuration as mine, except mine has 2x the video memory and a faster hard disk) on his website AnandTech. For all those Mac bashers, you should take a look; he makes quite a few good points.

Transferring to OSU is progressing slowly, but nicely.

I just read this on some webpage about XML and RSS: "Everyone's doing it! Heard of RSS? Seen those cool xml and RSS buttons on your favorite web sites and blogs?" Cool XML and RSS buttons? They are orange with the text XML or RSS on them. It would take about 10 seconds to make in MSPaint. They aren't cool. Every one doing it? What, subscribing to millions of feeds and having it update every minute just to hear something new as soon as possible? Sounds like a good use of bandwidth... Actually...This Slashdot article comes to mind. And yes, I read Slashdot, especially for the comments! THEY ARE THE BEST!

I have made some progress with CEInfoBar. I'm going to have to refactor iTunesLibrarian to continue working on it which is going to suck.

And to finish things up, here is a pick I'm sure Ed will enjoy (the original file name was "ThoroughlyModernMillie"):

I haven't done much of anything besides play Warcraft 3. What a waist of time! Christmas was fun with Ed being home and such. I'm still on break, and will be for the next week or so. I'll probably be just as worthless in the upcoming week unfortunately. It's weird how I plan on doing things during breaks and then get absolutely nothing done. I have days where I get a TON done or maybe even 3 or so days in a row, then its nothing for weeks. I have no idea why it happens that way, but that?s the way it happens.

Without further anticipation, here is my longest-time-in-between-posts post!

So, here?s a screen shot of my current workings. At the top you can see what CEInfoBar currently looks like. From the right, a memory meter, a CPU meter, CPU history, iTunes controller, WinAMP controller, and a clock. The bottom left is the configuration screen for CEInfoBar. To the right is iTunes Librarian.

I worked about a week on a LAN file distribution program, which turned out to be slower than I expected, so I used BitTorrent at the LAN party (Fifth Annual ThanksGibbing) in which I wrote it for. I RARed the games for distribution and such (dumb Word not knowing the verb RAR). BitTorrent maxed at 2 MB a second, so it took a while to transfer files over which sucked. Then it took 30 min to unRAR, which I was expecting closer to a max of 10 min. Any way, I learned a lot from the experience. The LAN went quite well, probably the best I have ever had.

I?d rather not talk about school, although I may transfer to OSU for next fall. The semester will be over in 2 weeks which is nice.

Work on my personal site (obive.net) has come to a halt since the only browser that works correctly with the standards I use (really simple JavaScript and some CSS2) is Gecko based browsers such as FireFox. Even Safari doesn?t work =(, not to mention The ShitFest ? otherwise known as Internet Explorer.

As for the current games I play, that would be Warcraft 3, TFC, and UT 2004.

I got a new Monitor, WHOO!!! I may write a review of my Sony and my new one soon, if my non-existent schedule permits.

I?m working on a new .NET program to clean missing tracks from your iTunes library, find album art on amazon.com and add it to the library, and clean all album art from library. DOESN?T THAT SOUND AWSOME?

cosmotic: and you contridicted your self toby
toby: no, i didn't
cosmotic: "java literally can't be faster" contradicts ?"obviously possible for java to be faster"
(and yes, I know that yourself is one word)

Well, I?m back at Kent. Tom and I have an apartment together. It?s quite nice. Work on the survey stuffs has progressed quite nicely. Classes so far are so-so. I really like my American Politics instructor. PowerBook is on order? I can?t wait! I?ve been watching Farscape, it?s too bad that show got the axe. Why do TV Networks do that? Dumbos. It turns out that digital cable is two times more expensive than satellite here, so were going to get that soon. Tootaloo!

For those that are interested, Ed gets back next week. For more information (such as a countdown to the minute) check out his website.

This is my last week here at American Greetings for the summer. I?ll have two weeks before school starts, may be able to actually work on something. Might play games. Might watch StarTrekAlicious. I won?t be playing Doom 3 ? Yet. I?m going to wait until I can play at high settings (my GF4 4600 wont cut it). I know, I know. The period should be inside the parenthesis, but I don?t like that rule.

I had a nice time in Chicago. Had some Thai, went to the Apple Store, and misc other city things. Paul and I Fixed their Netgear router and man Netgear quality has gone down hill in the past few years. Too bad. I like (liked) Netgear.

We got Gino?s East Pizza Saturday for lunch. (Not to be confused with Gino?s) It was pretty good. The crust on Papa John?s tastes a lot better though. Next time we will have to try another place.

Crazy stupid people at the airport. It?s stupid people capitol of the world. I?d like to see some statistics on how effective these new screening processes are at the security checkpoint. Seems like they would be pretty ineffective to me. They waist a LOT of time too?

Some whore yanked my Warcraft 3 key at the recent Ghood LAN. Curses on him. I hope he is one of the few lucky people to get struck by lightning 3 times (which is more likely than falling victim to a terrorist attack.) I?m using Chris?s key again. That is until Mr. Whore dies a slow and painful death. Whore is a nice word. Has a nice windy sound. Whore. Whore? WHORE? Yeah, good word.

Going to Chicago this weekend... Went to a LAN party this past weekend... Nothing super exciting since work takes so much time... LATER

For those interested: Why are Yellow trucks orange?

Well the two weeks of camp are now over. It was really fun this year. We played a lot of Volley Ball which was fun. The campers this year were really nice. We made a great project as a group (the 6 Java campers.) We are probably going to re-make the camp website and post the project. I'll be sure to link it up when we do.

Keith and I started work on Jragon Jrop. I don't know if we will ever get that finished. I hope so though.

Ed is still in Asia, and it's not as fun here without him.

I may post some camp pictures soon... Later!

Well, I'm working still. Not much free time. I'm going to camp soon! WAHOO! Later!

I clicked the more info link in CEIP to get more info on the web. I then clicked the send question via email link. Then the clippie (which was suppose to be default to off in office XP, let alone 2003) told me that a dialog box is open and I needed to close it before a new email could be started

The ?select available fields? dropdown is on the bottom in address-card view ?show fields? window, but on the top in the list view ?show fields? window.

When I first started the program I typed my initials in incorrectly, but could not find where to change it. When I searched help for it (which it defaulted to online search, instead of offline, which it should ask before doing so) came up with completely off-topic answers (I searched for ?initials?) I then searched the offline help, the results were mostly the same, but instead of titles and then captions like the online search, it was just the titles. More inconsistency.

Trying to add a new field ?test? as a yes/no icon when an existing field ?test? as a yes/no icon says that I cant add it since there?s already named one like it. It should use the current field instead of erroring.

The clippie is giving me less-efficient tips (double clicking the icon to ?jump between errors?, which ?between? is not the correct word) for using spell check, when I?m right-clicking errors to correct them. (My way is 2/3s the clicks as its way, and less mouse movement)

It gave me another suggestion to double click to type here. I noticed this WAY after the cursor had moved, so ?here? would be the wrong word, and extremely confusing.

Word crashed after the first sentence of this document and I had to start over.

Admin popup closed before I could read it

I?ve found 2 errors using outlook 2003 for the first 5 min, then 3 more errors while trying to submit feedback, and then 3 more while trying write a word document documenting the errors

While making that new line a question popped up from clippie, but then disappeared when I backspaced, and I could not find out what it said. Reproducing what I did does not make it come back up.

Well, this weekend (after the storms on Friday) we had no power! It came back on Sunday night at around 9 PM, then went off and on a few times during the night, and Monday (today) then went back off at 6 PM (after we had purchased some frozen groceries.) Cable (and internet, because we have cable internet) were off until around 9 PM tonight (Monday). What misery. The people at First Energy Corporation are fat-head-hippopotami! GOD! So, since there was basically nothing to do, all that was left was *gasp* outside things. We walked the Scuzz man, did some gardening (vegetable), etc. Well, back to work. I was looking forward to this weekend to have some programming time (that would lead to game time) but alas, NO POWER!