All of the holiday photos from 2009 are in the Photo Albums. Have a look! I've also updated several other sections while I was at it.

Household Ideas:

• Good Coffee Beans

Steve's List:

• Mac mini (4GB RAM Version)
  

Nicole's List:

• iPod Touch
• Pajamas

Rachel & Smantha's List

• Any Size Balls To Play With
• Pool Toys
• Sandbox Toys (non-plastic trucks, etc.)

Here are some quick ways to add some color to BASH and VI in OS X. The below will edit the global files for all users and use just some quick color options. If you want to do this, you can probably figure out how to do this on a per-account basis and do some custom colors too. This has only been tested (so far) with Mac OS X 10.6, but it likely works with 10.5 and even 10.4.

Why do this? If you've ever used virtually any Linux distribution on the planet, you'll see these options are enabled by default. I find colorized directory listings helpful. Seeing code colorized in VI is extremely helpful because you can spot simple typos quickly. I have no idea why after six generations of OS X (I don't count 10.0 as an OS, yuk!) Apple never made this default.

BASH

1. Edit your /etc/bashrc file.
2. Add these two lines to the end:
   export CLICOLOR=1
   export TERM=xterm-color
3. Save.

The default settings are: exfxcxdxbxegedabagacad

Color options are:

a     black 
b     red 
c     green 
d     brown 
e     blue 
f     magenta 
g     cyan 
h     light grey 
A     bold black, usually shows up as dark grey 
B     bold red 
C     bold green 
D     bold brown, usually shows up as yellow 
E     bold blue 
F     bold magenta 
G     bold cyan 
H     bold light grey; looks like bright white 
x     default foreground or background 

The directory color order is:

1. directory
2. symbolic link
3. socket
4. pipe
5. executable
6. block special
7. character special
8. executable with setuid bit set
9. executable with setgid bit set
10. directory writable to others, with sticky bit
11. directory writable to others, without sticky bit

VI

1. Edit your /usr/share/vim/vimrc file.
2. Add these two lines to the end:
   :set term=builtin_xterm
   :syntax on
3. Save

Unlike my Time Warner experience, my communication with Master Lock was outstanding to the point they have a lifelong customer for any lock needs I will ever have.

In June '09 I purchased a set of three vinyl-coated weatherproof locks for our pool gates, we only needed two however the convenience of the same key set plus a spare lock was a bonus.

About 30 days later the first lock failed with all loss of the ability to turn the key. Last week, the other two followed suit. This lock set was only about $20, but darn it, I expect things to last.

I called Master Lock to see if something could be done and explain the situation. I was on hold for less than 30 seconds, and the lady the answered knew the model number of my lock by description only. Further, I learned that all their locks carry a lifetime warranty. Without skipping a beat she took my name, address, phone number and informed me three new locks are on the way.

All of this with no questions asked. I didn't need a receipt and I didn't need to send the locks in as "proof" they were broken. Thank you Master Lock.

In a new tab, browse to about:config. Locate that change the following:

browser.link.open_external -> 3
browser.link.open_newwindow -> 3
browser.link.open_newwindow.restriction -> 0

One or more of the above may not be in your particular configuration. Just change the ones that are available.

Birthday party pictures are up in the photo albums for anyone interested!

I've been using ASSP for while now as our email proxy service. It's kept us clean and clear of tons of spam while OS X's email service has been filtering out the viruses thanks to ClamAV.

The server project over this holiday season was to disable OS X's virus scanner and go with ASSP doing everything. The OS X email service will be responsible for solely delivering email. The advantage to this is that viruses will never go through ASSP, then to OS X, and then get scanned and rejected. Instead ASSP will drop them at the front door and that will be that.

After installing a bunch of Perl modules for the new version of ASSP, it's working, and working very well. ASSP is still even using the version of ClamAV that shipped with OS X, which has the added bonus of less work for me. Apple often updates the ClamAV binary as part of it's Software Update process, so I will know that it will always be up-to-date.

The 2008 Christmas pictures are up in the Photo Albums.  Enjoy!

I'm a little late to the party on this, but I'm glad I discovered Dr. Horrible's Sing Along Blog. It seems during writers strikes, Joss Whedon of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Firefly fame is not idle. Done on a shoe-string budget and released on the web only, this 45 minute 3 act musical is hilarious. You can watch it right on-line at the above address too.

A DVD is in the works as well as a sequel.  You can also purchase it on iTunes (the video as well as the soundtrack, which is also fantastic, BTW.)

Getting prepared for HD with my home brew PVR has been fun. The final piece of the puzzle was getting GB-PVR, my PC, and Time Warner HD box talking. Items needed:

Tim Moore's firestb Package
ExDeus' STB Firewire Driver Package

Since I'm using GB-PVR and not MCE, Tim's package needs to be installed using the following arguements: msiexec /i firestb.msi IDENT=”1”

Next, if you're like me, you'll find Tim's package of drivers are a bit dated, you'll need to use ExDeus' package if you have a modern HD receiver.  Just follow standard "Add new Hardware" protocol once you connect your receiver via Firewire.

Finally, test your install using the channel command and the instructions provided. I learned, although it is not clearly documented, that there are several different ways to send channel commands to a receiver.  These are accomplished using the -a flag. For example, to change to channel 300 the command for my 4250HDC would be: C:\channel -f -a0 2 300

All done! Just use GB-PVR's built in exe caller for channel changing to call the channel program and execute the commands!

Update 01/06/10: These still work in Windows 7, however you may have to choose the driver for your Fireware/1394 card that has (legacy) after its name.