I’m looking for comments from both MarsEdit and Ecto users.

I would like to be able to pick one or the other for full time WordPress blogging. Make sure when making comments you indicate what service (WordPress) you use with either of these two apps.

They both have good looking interfaces and functionality appears to be similar. So you power users let me and everyone else know what you think.

Please be clear about which app you speak of and if you have comparison stories share those as well.

I’m trying to figure out which is the best WordPress client, Ecto or MarsEdit. This post is being made by Ecto.

As you can see from the pick above my internet is an OK speed.

As I edit this post I see that Ecto is very clever. I like the way it works.

I’m trying to figure out which is the best WordPress client, Ecto or MarsEdit. This post is being made by MarsEdit.

As you can see from the pick above my internet is an OK speed.

As I edit this post I see that MarsEdit is very clever. I like the way it works.

Save $50 on each new Drobo and Drobo Bundle (FireWire Only) by using code “TheMacJedi” at the Drobo Store

When NetShare became available on the App Store (the second time 8/1/2008) I bought it and downloaded it. I hadn’t even tried to set it up or use it. Within an hour of downloading it the apps on my iPhone stopped opening. So I did a restore to my iPhone which took more than an hour. Everything looked good but when I went to open an app on my iPhone it wouldn’t. So I went into iTunes and told it to not sync apps, therefore removing them. Then I syncing again to reinstall them. It didn’t work, the apps on my iPhone still wouldn’t open. I decided to delete all of the apps from iTunes, re-download them and then reinstall them on my iPhone.

Hours later I had re-downloaded all my apps except one, NetShare, why? Because it wasn’t available anymore. Apple had for the second time pulled the app from the store. Only they removed my ability to download it even though I bought it.

After sending iTunes Support a message that I was unable to re-download NetShare they sent me this reply on 8/4/2008.

Dear Rob,

Eric
iTunes Store Customer Support

Their reply being completely unacceptable I replied back with this message today (8/16/2008 8:09 PM).

Your reply is unacceptable. The reply is basically saying “Thank you for buying from the App Store but you can’t have what you paid for.”

Thanks

Within 5 minutes of sending that message I received this email (8/16/2008 8:14 PM).

Dear Rob Jones,

Amount: $10.69 USD

At first I didn’t think that I could have received a refund that quickly from a message that was 5 minutes old until I received this message from Apple (8/16/2008 8:31 PM)

Dear Rob,

Eric
iTunes Store Customer Support

Wow, his analogy is so wrong I don’t even know where to begin. Apple did exactly what I said I didn’t want which was give me a refund and didn’t do what I asked for which was re-download NetShare.

This morning my client was telling me that their dog Sterling, who had been left alone overnight peed on the telephone that was on the floor. Even more funny than that, it really was an IP Telephone.

I transferred about 30 to 50 posts per day and topped that off with the comments and now my previous RapidWeaver site is running on WordPress.

I’m still learning my way around WordPress but I’m very impressed.

Now I can get back to making regular posts.

I just figured out how to add forms to my new WordPress website and my head is spinning with ideas.

I certainly won’t be able to rebuilt any (RapidWeaver) form heavy clients sites soon but the prospect is there.

Right now the hardest part is waiting for theme developers to update their themes to be compatible with WordPress 2.6. A few free themes work and look great while others are broken and that makes it difficult to choose. I think I changed my theme today 10 times.

Themes is an area where RapidWeaver is currently ahead. Most WordPress themes have a single color, the same theme in a different color is completely seperate file and appears as a separate theme. RapidWeaver solved that problem a couple years ago when they incorporated the ability to modify most of the colors for any new theme.

Some WordPress themes have settings thay can be changed but nowhere near the level of RapidWeaver. I’ll just work around that until both WordPress and its theme developers catch up.

Once I have a good grasp of most aspects of WordPress then I only have to convert my other blog, my daughter’s blog, my other daughter’s blog and my wife’s blog.

I’ve been using RapidWeaver for my own sites and client sites for 4 years. I’m not a coder but I have taken the time to learn some code to customize my sites. RapidWeaver is an awesome website tool, which has benefited many of my clients. However, my sites are blogs, and while RW produces great blog pages they are missing a few features that I want.

The main drawback to a RW blog is that it’s machine dependent, meaning which ever machine your RW project file is on is the only one that can update the site or blog. In some cases, changes to the RW project require it to republish the entire blog (hundreds of posts). There are options and plugins that allow for some of the functionality to be added to RW but I finally decided I wanted a more flexible solution.

WordPress, after spending some time online looking for database driven sites I concluded WordPress was best for my needs. Since yesterday I’ve replicated the majority of the layout options I had before and I’m very satisfied.

More importantly than the layout is the ability to post to my blog from just about anywhere. For instance this post is being created from my iPhone while I sit outside with my dog. However, I could post from almost any computer on the internet, that’s the flexibility I was looking for.

I’m going to take the time to manually port all of my RW blog posts to my new WP blog. There isn’t a tool to import directly from RW. I’m OK with that, it will give me the opportunity to make sure they are correctly input.

So far I’ve made sure that my homepage is current, only a few hundred old posts to port.

2008-07-11 09:50 AM I was to meet a client at the Oxmoor Mall (Louisville, KY) at 10 AM and wait in line together to get the new iPhone 3G. I arrived at the Mall with a Starbucks coffee I had already picked up. My client was already in line and had been waiting for more than an hour. He was in about the middle of the line and since I couldn’t wait there I was about to head towards the end of the line when I received a phone call; it was my brother Toby. Toby said he was at the end of the line (which I couldn’t see because it wrapped around the corner). I said I would be there within a minute. After saying “I’ll CYA later” to my client, I headed towards the end of the line. As I reached the end of the line Toby stepped back behind the two people he was in front of.

The Apple Store had a couple employees walk by asking if we had any questions and passing out water. The guy in front of me and Toby sat down on the fountain and I jokingly said, “Ohhh come on, we just got here, you can’t be tired already”. The people in front of us (10 people up) were sitting down in the chairs at the Starbucks cafe which was dangerously close to the line. And then they proceeded to scoot those chairs along as the line moved.

2008-07-11 10:45 AM A woman approached us asking if we worked at the Mall. It was an odd question since we were standing in line. After saying no she proceeded to explain that she had just purchased something from Sharper Image (who’s going out of business) and they didn’t have anyone to carry it to her car. She offered pay two of us $15 each to help her. I said, “Sorry, no, but I’m sure you can find help from someone who isn’t standing in line”. The guy in front of me said, “I didn’t know what to say to her.” I said, “She obviously used the least amount of effort to find someone to help her since we were standing outside Sharper Image. She can find someone else.”

2008-07-11 10:32 AM

You can see in this photo a Starbucks chair in the line and further up my client in a green shirt and khakis pants.

2008-07-11 11:15 AM Mall security came along and told everyone they had to put their chairs back. Even the guy with a cast. However, they did get him a wheel chair. I finally finished my coffee and Toby had just got back from getting himself one. Occasionally chatting with the people in front of us and the kid in a wheelchair behind us.

2008-07-11 11:53 AM

In 1.5 hours we had only moved to where the chair is from the previous picture.

2008-07-11 12:03 PM In line for the iPhone 3G, they are telling people they have plenty but the wait could be 5 hours because AT&T servers are down. Sad face

After hearing the AT&T server went down I expected more people to get out of line, but they didn’t. Apple employees still walking around answering questions and passing out water.

2008-07-11 12:05 PM I’m in the Oxmoor Mall in Louisville, KY. iPhone 3G, I can wait. Line is still moving. And I have 2.0 on my current iPhone. SuperMonkeyBall

2008-07-11 12:12 PM I’ve already been in line for 2 hours. My feet hurt a little, which is sad since I used to run the Mini Marathon (13 miles) in under 2 hours

2008-07-11 12:17 PM Twitterrific on the iPhone works very well, while I wait in line for the iPhone 3G. Easy to read and post. I like it a lot. Happy face ;-)

2008-07-11 12:20 PM My brother Toby who was in line with me for the first 2 hours has returned to work. No iPhone 3G for him. I have Twitter to keep me warm ;-)

My brother left and I was still standing without sit down or a restroom break. Now I’m getting hungry.

2008-07-11 01:12 PM 3 hours now waiting in line for the iPhone 3G. Gary did you block me? You listed me in that tweet. Thinking about sitting down

Other than my feet hurting I was still standing without a sit down or restroom break.

2008-07-11 02:04 PM 4 hours and waiting for the iPhone 3G. I’m 50 feet from the Apple Store entrance. I’m going to be quite hungry after I get it.

I’ve already sat down on the floor letting my feet relax. A lady who was sitting up against a wall was asked not to.

2008-07-11 03:02 PM 5 hours now waiting for the iPhone 3G. 20 feet from the Apple Store entrance. Could be done by 4 or dinner time which ever comes first.

2008-07-11 03:05 PM

2008-07-11 03:24 PM My client who waited more than 6.5 hours just left, they could not activate his new iPhone 3G. He has a ticket to come back. Ouch :-(

His problem was he was on a business account and the transfer did not go through as expected.

2008-07-11 03:27 PM I’m standing in the Apple Store foyer, next to the security guard. They can only let so many people in at one time. Need food.

I laughed out loud when I realized there was a line inside the store.

2008-07-11 03:30 PM

I was just let into the store.

2008-07-11 03:48 PM Almost 6 hours of waiting for the iPhone 3G so far and my current iPhone battery is almost dead. I’m close to the middle of the store. ;-)

As I passed the AppleTV display I tuned it to one of my Flickr Sets.

2008-07-11 04:08 PM Finished the purchase of my iPhone, now off to set it up with another Apple employee. As I was switching employees my client had returned to the store to see if they could get him setup now. I told him I would check up on him before I left. After getting setup I went back to check on my client, he was not happy, he wasn’t going to get his iphone 3G today. Not only did he also wait in line 6 hours to get it but he’s 72. As we turned to leave the store I passed my brother Toby who had left 4 hours ago, he was buying two iPhones. He talked his way into the store because I was the guy he was standing with in line and the Apple employees remembered him.

2008-07-11 04:35 PM I just walked out of the Apple Store with my new White iPhone 3G. Time for something to eat.

After 6 hours of standing without a restroom break or food, all of the sudden a restroom break was the only thing I could think about. Follow that up with a soda and some pretzels and I was ready to head home. Several time while carrying my new iphone in a bag I could feel it vibrate, missed calls. Toby said that after I bought my iPhone and left the store Apple bought snacks for people still in line.

As I was walking towards my car I passed the same guy who was in front of me in line all day. He said he was having a problem getting his phone activated and I said “Let me guess, business line” he said yes.

After getting home I rewarded my youngest daughter with my old iPhone, she was so excited it actually surprised me.

I went out this morning and bought a bunch of causal t-shirts and then let my wife and my girls pick which one I would wear today.

They unanamously picked this one.

I’m not going to go into depth about MobileMe features because you can find 100’s of those reports elsewhere.

I want to point out that MobileMe is a rebranding and update of DotMac, which was a rebranding and update of iTools.

When Steve Jobs first announced the switch from iTools to DotMac he made referrence to the fact that Miscrosoft was even sure what their own DotNet service was for. While these two services weren’t anything alike that didn’t matter, DotMac was touted as Apple’s way of knowing how to implement a service Microsoft had started. So Apple used Microsofts own marketing to it’s benifit. DotMac was not competition for DotNet, it just adopted the naming convention.

When Phil Schiller was finished touting all of the features of MobileMe over DotMac he refered to it as “Exchange for the rest of us”. Yes, Exchange would be another Microsoft technolgy. Still not a direct competitor but certainly much closer than before. MobileMe and Exchange do many of the same things.

This would be the second time Apple used a Mirosoft technolgy to promote it’s own. Clever Apple, you can’t fool us, we know you don’t invent everything, just the really good stuff.

About 5 years ago I had just arrived at work and I had to enter a PIN into the door lock, the same PIN I had been entering for a couple years.

I couldn’t remember it, I hadn’t just come back from vacation or anything I used it the day before. Someone let me in and later that day I requested my number because I still couldn’t remember it. When the number was given to me, same number I had always used, it didn’t look familiar. It didn’t spark any memories of “Ohh yeah that’s it”, it was completely gone. I even went back and asked “Are you sure you gave me the same number?” They had.

About 3 years ago I was at Sam’s Club and forgot my business card PIN. Exact same scenario, I called my wife who could find it at the time. I had to leave without making a purchase, I got home and found the paper with my PIN on it and it did not look familiar. To this day I’m confused by it. It’s as if the day I looked it up after forgetting it was the very first memory of it.

It happened again today. I was helping my wife with her RapidWeaver project and showed her how to do something. She asked if there was an easier way to do that, I was certain there was so I took the time to figure it out. And figure it out I did. I showed her how it worked and what settings to select which are not the default settings. I decided to update up my own project files with the newly learned knowledge. So I opened my main project file and went to the Page Inspector and the settings was already selected, not on just that page but every page on all my projects.

Had I not gone back to update my pages I might not have noticed that I had at one time already figured out how to do this and would not know that I had even forgotten it.

I think the really important question is “What have I forgotten that I don’t know I forgot?”

P.S. I regularly brag about my memory because it’s way above average, but I think I may have a synapse or two that need replacing.

If you’re anything like me, then you are very excited about Monday. If you don’t know what Monday is then you’re not like me. Monday at 1:00 PM (EDT) Santa Steve Jobs gives goodies to all the girls and boys, you don’t even have to be good.

I’ve read the rumors, I’ve watched DotMac go down, I’ve heard AT&T coverage plans and there is a lot to be excited about on Monday. Steve will give a keynote presentation and talk about all the things going on with iPhone, Macs and DotMac. This is the first time I’m more excited about announcements that aren’t related to the Mac.

Come Monday at 1:00 PM (EDT), I’ll be ready with 52oz of tea and a bag of chips. Interuptions during keynote time are inexcusable.

Click here to read my article about receiving to ticket.

My day (5/29/2008) started out much earlier than it usually does. I got up at 7 AM, took a shower, got dressed and left by 8 AM. I stopped at the bank and withdrew $200 and then on my way to Louisville I stopped and got me a coffee from Starbucks. I reached downtown at 8:45 AM and had to pay $6 to park. I was in the courthouse by 8:50 AM and was waiting outside the courtroom with a couple hundred people. They started letting people in the courtroom at 9 AM, as I entered the courtroom people had already bunched up at the beginning of the smallest bench isles I’ve ever seen. I walked around and stepped over a 30” wall to get a seat when the bailiff said “Don’t do that, that’s not a bar” I was already over so I just sat down and didn’t say anything. Then a short time later I was asked to move down to allow more people in. These benches were ridiculously narrow, like the backseat of a Porsche. I was somewhat nervous from just being in the position of waiting to defend myself and could feel it in my stomach.

At 9:10 AM the judge (Kevin W. Delahanty) entered the courtroom, everyone was asked to rise, a few words were said and everyone sat down. I saw one of my clients (Derwin Webb) in the courtroom who is an attorney, it looked as if he was there defending other people, I handle his website hosting and email. There were people already in the courtroom asking the scheduled visitors if they were going to plea innocent or guilty, then they had them sit down again. It was hard for me to hear (I don’t hear that well) with all of the commotion in the courtroom. At 9:15 AM the courtroom got quiet while the judge addressed everyone about the rules of the courtroom and what their options are when approaching the podium. Then it got loud again. Anyone who was not on the docket was asked to leave the courtroom to make room for more people. The judge began to call names to the podium and two other people who had already been calling names the whole time were still calling names.

At 9:40 AM my name was called by one of the people handling pre-judgment information. The gentlemen asked me how do I plea as I’m standing next to him and I said “Innocent”, he asked if I wanted to do community service or go to trial, I said “Are those my only two options?”. He said they were so I said “Go to trial”, he said OK and got up and said “I’m going to get your police officer and make sure he’s here for the trial”, the gentlemen walked passed me and headed out of the courtroom and I said “Do I just wait here?” he said “No have a seat your trial will be about 12:30”. So I sat down and waited. Lots of people were shuffled through the judge and the pre-judgment people, every time someone had to pass you, you had to compress yourself into your seat so they could get by.

I saw the officer who ticked me and Derwin Webb a couple of times in and out of the court room. As the courtroom thinned slightly we were asked to move again, so we all moved to the back of the courtroom. Then a short time later asked to move again. At 10:45 AM I need to use the restroom, while the judge was busy with other people I exited the courtroom to use the restroom, while in the hallway I saw Derwin again and I said “I saw you in 102” he asked what I was doing in there and I said “defending myself against a speeding ticket” he said “Do you need me in there, cause I’ll help you out?” I said “No, I got this one, I have plenty of evidence” he said “OK, well let me know if you need anything I’ll take care of you and call me about my site” I said “OK, thanks, talk to you later”. Back in the courtroom I was again waiting and listening to all of the other people approach the podium. From this point forward the officer who ticketed me was in the courtroom waiting like I was. Not once did he make eye contact with me, he couldn’t have missed me I was wearing my “Rob Jones Tech Support” t-shirt.

At 11:00 AM the judge took a break and the pre-judgement people were still working with people. At 11:25 AM I needed to use the restroom again (it was a large coffee), I was nervous if I left they wouldn’t let me back in or they would call my name and I would miss it but I went anyway and made it back 2 minutes before the judge came back into the court room. Everyone rose again and sat down. At 11:35 AM the judge called my name and as I rose to approach the podium he said “Have a seat Mr. Jones we’re going to move you to the end of the docket”.

The judge finally called me to the podium at 11:50 AM. I approached the podium as did the officer and the prosecuting attorney. He started by saying “Do you swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you God?” we both said yes. He asked the officer to present his statement, the officer stated his name his position he mentioned the calibration of the radar gun, the judge asked him about the ticket, he said that he observed me traveling at a high rate of speed when he got me on the radar and again observed me through his mirror. The judge asked about the conditions and the officer said there were no other cars around and that nothing had obstructed his view of me. The prosecuting attorney asked if the officer or I knew each other or if we had any grudges against one another and we both said no.

Then the judge turned to me and asked if I had any question for the officer, I said no. He instructed me to proceed with my statement, I started out by indicating I had an illustration of the incident and I handed one to the prosecuting attorney and one to the bailiff for the judge. The illustration I handed them was three pages, the last page was the incident written down as I remembered it, the second page was an illustration of positions 3 and 4, the first page was the important one that contained position 1 and 2.

I began to explain that Position 1 was the last point in which the officer could have got a reading of 51MPH from one of the cars in front of me because I was not doing 51. I explained that from that position the officer who was approximately 500 ft away could not have gotten an accurate read from my car because even if he had been using a more accurate Lidar gun instead of Radar gun the the beam at the distance is 2 ft wide and needs to be pointed at the facing part of the vehicle which the officer could not have possibly seem. I expected the officer to have video of the incident because on the ticket it says “Radar” and “In-Car-Camera”. His video would confirm what I was saying and would have shown all three cars passing him closely together, but he didn’t have his video, just his testimony. I was also wondering if the judge noticed just a few minutes earlier the officer indicated there were no cars around me yet I’m claiming there were with detail to their make and color.

At this point the prosecuting attorney said “I object to this document, it’s not an actual picture of the incident he placed these cars in these positions.” I became nervous because I went to all this trouble to accurately depict the situation and it never dawned on me that the judge might dismiss my illustration. The judge looked at me and said “This is a satellite image of the area and you have placed the cars in these positions?” I said “That is correct” The judge said “What does land look like here, is there a hill?” I said “There is a slight dip and that’s all” the judge asked me “Is this an accurate representation of all vehicles?” I said “Yes judge, It couldn’t be more accurate”. The judge looked at the prosecuting attorney and said “I’ll allow it”.

Then the prosecuting attorney and the officer began to look at my illustration while the judge asked me if I had anything else. I said “The red line indicates the line-of-site for the officer and he couldn’t see enough of my car to get a reading” I also pointed out that the vehicles in front of me were larger than my car. The judge asked if I had anything else, I said “The reason my speed is listed as Possibly 35 MPH is because I hadn’t yet looked at my speedometer. As I passed the parked police car there is a 35 MPH sign directly in front of his car which is when I confirmed I was doing 35 MPH. The prosecuting attorney said “Because you caught up to the other cars you must have been driving faster than 35 MPH” I said “No, the reason I closed on them was because when they saw the police car they slowed down abruptly closing the gap between us, I never slowed down.” The judge asked me if I had anything else, I said “I wasn’t driving over 35 MPH, the radar reading the officer received could not have been from my car, nor could he have received an accurate reading from my car at that distance with those two cars in front of me.”

The judge asked me if I had anything else, I said “No judge I don’t.” The judge asked the prosecuting attorney if they had anything else, he said “No we don’t”

The judge said something and the officer began to leave the courtroom, I looked at the judge and said “What just happened?” the judge looked at me and said “You won”, I looked at the prosecuting attorney who was smiling real big at me and then I looked at the bailiff who was also smiling at me, I looked at the judge and said “That’s it?” he said “That’s it” I said “Do I need to sign anything?” he said “No, your free to go.” I smiled real big and exited the courtroom. I assume what I didn’t hear the judge say was “Judgement is for the defendant”.

Several days later I asked Derwin how likely it was that I would win my trial, he said, “Congratulations! It is EXTREMELY RARE that someone wins a bench trial pro se. Hats off to you!”

As an adult the only thing for me that comes close to the anticipation of Christmas and then Christmas morning is the MacWorld keynote hosted my Steve Jobs.

I literally feel excited, I can’t wait for it to start, I prepare with food and drink so I won’t have to get up.

Now I read the updates from about 4 sites at one time, previously I watched it Live when they did that.

I’ve never been to one but hopefully I won’t have to wait much longer.

It’s almost here, less than two weeks away.

I’m certain that I do things that others don’t when it comes to games like Halo and GTA. When I used to play campaign with my nephew he would shoot the Marines for fun and it would bother me. I told him not to do that, not because the Marines were helpful but because they were on our side and they communicated with us. When I started playing GTA4 a couple weeks ago I would run a lot, look for parked cars to jack and avoid all pedestrians. I never run over pedestrians for fun, or shoot them or anything like that. I will take someone’s car to speed up the story.

I’ve even tried to finish a GTA4 mission without killing cops, I did however shoot them in the leg (Terminator style). The game didn’t let me, no problem, I kill them all and escape. Maybe I could have knocked them out or something else but I didn’t try. I assume the mission was designed to have me kill them, in the game to police aren’t that respectable.

I don’t mind the violence, I still attempt to make a decent decision. It’s just a game and the majority of it fun, that which isn’t fun is just neutral (doesn’t affect me either way).

There has been this recurring problem with syncing my iPhone to iPhoto. I plug my iPhone into the USB port, iTunes comes to life and syncs my music, calendars and so on. But I took pictures with my iPhone, that’s suppose to make iPhoto come to life and let me import them. For many months iPhoto would not recognize my iPhone, I reset my iPhone, deleted preferences, restarted, nothing would make it work. So last night I spent a couple hours researching the problem. I read dozens of entire threads on people with similar problems.

In the middle of one of the threads someone posted “TRY A DIFFERENT USB PORT”. I wanted to blast them for wasting my time and posting such a simple fix to the problem. But then I remembered one of my clients was having trouble with their USB modem adapter and the solution was to use the USB port closest to the front of the MacBook. I paused for moment, looked to see which USB port I was using, it was the one furthest from the front of my MacBook. It couldn’t possibly be that simple, I unplugged the USB cable and moved it to the USB port closest to the front of the MacBook. Hello iPhoto, it popped up and was ready to import my photos. I couldn’t believe it, not because it worked but because I has inadvertently used the rear USB every time without even thinking about it.

That leads to a hardware question. What’s wrong with the rear USB port on the MacBook?

This is a list of games that are on their fourth version and also the first time I’ve ever played them. GTA4 is amazing, I had also never played a GTA game before. It’s so much better than games that are similar. COD4 is awesome, I had never played COD before this one and I’ve invested more time in it than Halo 3. MGS, another game I’ve never played but MGS4 is going to make me buy a PS3. With DualShock3 of course.

I grabbed a snapshot of my first three twitters or tweets as people are calling them. My first and oldest tweet is at the bottom.

Look at the dates between my second tweet and my third tweet. Now that’s commitment to a joke. I wanted to tweet several times before that but resisted. Then I forgot about twitter, then I wanted tweet again. I almost forgot to post again on the same day. Now I’ll be using it all the time.

Today I’m 37. My first phone call of the day was a downed server. So much for not working on my birthday. It’s actually no big deal that I’m working on my birthday because I enjoy what I do.

About the server, it seems as though it forgot who it was. So Time Machine (and about hour of time) reminded it and we were back in business. Thank you Time Machine, you kept me from having to rebuild the server.

The funny card from my wife.

Yesterday Karen and I were watching the latest episode of How I Met Your Mother. During the “The Bracket” episode “Anna” who thought Barney was Ted Mosby said she had created the website http://tedmosbyisajerk.com/. I immediately paused my TiVo, Karen gave me the look because she knew I was going to look it up and see if it was real (they rarely are). To my surprise the site was real and had a couple of pages including the letter Barney left for Anna and he forgot to sign it Ted Mosby.

The site was very funny. Karen and I got a huge laugh out of it. So last night I decided to send an email to the person who registered the site and tell them how much we enjoyed it.

Today at 4:28PM my iPhone rang and the display said “Blocked”. I never get Blocked calls so I decided to see who it was. To my surprise is was Carl MacLaren one of the show’s producers and the person the show’s bar is named after “MacLaren’s Bar”. How awesome is that? He thanked me for my kind words and appreciated the fact that I went to the trouble to let them know I enjoyed the website. Then, and this is even funnier, because it’s obvious to anyone who reads my email signature that I’m in IT, Carl MacLaren asked me for tech support. Now that’s cool. Since I am very familiar with the question he was asking I was able to answer it quickly.

Carl MacLaren, I want to thank you for giving me a story that no one will ever believe because of what day it is.

There is a speed trap near where I live in Indiana and it annoys me every time I drive by it and see someone pulled over. I’ve been considering this article for six months now because of my annoyance with speed traps. What better time to write this article than two hours after receiving a speeding ticket. This is my first ticket in 13 years. The last ticket I received was on a highway late at night the day my Grandmother died and there wasn’t a car within sight of me.

Neither 13 years ago nor today was I driving in a reckless manner, nor was I driving in a way that endangered other drivers’ lives. In today’s case I was driving behind a couple of cars at a slower speed. The tickets issued (13 years ago and today) were not the product of an officer protecting the lives of a tax payer. The tickets were a way for the city to generate revenue, in my opinion. Is that why we have police officers? The officers are paid from our tax money. The officers pull us over to generate revenue. Why do we have officers generating revenue for a job in which they are already paid? It’s like he’s being paid by me to fine me.

Sidebar: I’m only talking about when officers are instructed to ticket people (speed traps) for money, which is not what they were hired for. I’m not talking about an officer risking his life or protecting mine, which is what they’re hired for.

But can you blame the officer? I don’t really think we can. As an employee (the officer) of an agency he doesn’t own, he can neither make rules or change them. For the most part, he simply follows the rules that have been laid out before him. He and I are alike in the sense that we are working to feed our families. I would think to an officer this would be one part of the job they would find most embarrassing.

The entire incident:
It was noon and I had just left Indian Hills neighborhood in Louisville, KY after doing a support job. Instead of taking a left and heading towards the highway (North East) I thought I would roll down my window and head right on Brownsboro Rd. (South West) towards Zorn Ave. and get a little fresh air because it’s 65 degrees and a very nice, sunny day. Less than a quarter mile from Indian Hills I was listening to a podcast and traveling behind a grey van and a black Acura when all of the sudden the Acura slowed down abruptly, I don’t remember having to even tap my brakes since I was driving slower and slightly further behind them. After the Acura slowed down I saw a police car parked in the right emergency lane. His car was facing the same direction we were traveling as was the police officer. After all three of us passed the parked police car, he turned his lights on, pulled out right behind me and followed me for about a half block. As he got closer I looked in my review mirror and pointed at myself to see if he wanted me to pull over or get out of the way. His hand gesture indicated he wanted me to pull over, which actually surprised me. I pulled over between a couple mailboxes and put my car in park. My window was already down. As the officer approached my window I asked, “How can I help you?” He said, “May I see your license please?” I said, “Yes.” I then removed it from my wallet and handed it to him. He proceeded to ask, “Is the address on your license correct?” I said, “Yes.” The officer asked, “Do you know what the speed limit is?” I said, “No, I don’t normally go this way.” He said, “You were doing 51 in a 35.” I didn’t respond (it’s unlikely that he actually targeted my car at 51 since I didn’t even see his car until after the Acura slowed down. Both the van and the Acura blocked my view of the police car. He said, “I’ll be right back.” I said, “OK.” After about 4 or 5 minutes he returned with my license and a piece of paper. I put my license away and looked at the paper. It was a Uniform Citation. I quickly glanced and saw $161. I said to the officer, “Does that say $161?” He said, “Let me see, yes it does.” I replied, “I barely made more than that to come over here.” He replied “Then it wasn’t worth it.” He then said, “Thank you.” and turned and walked away. As he pulled away from me he did a U-turn; I would assume to return to his position in the emergency lane.

By no means am I saying the officer is lying. I don’t know if the officer radared the van or the Acura that were in front of me. However, it’s obvious to me that he is mistaken and he did not witness or radar me at any speed.

I kind of picture the whole situation like the officer was The Lion and I was The Gazelle at the back of the herd.

I will be reporting to court at said date. The only thing on my mind will be “Not Guilty.” I may have some diagrams as well.

These are some illustrations I’ll taking with me to show that the officer would not have been able to get a read off my car. I’ve done my homework, I hope the judge will see that.

I look forward to owning an Apple TV. First I’m going to have to get a widescreen TV which is the only kind they work with. They also work with 480p TVs but what’s the point in that?

I don’t currently own an Apple TV but I do own an Xbox 360. And as it turns out the Xbox is one hell of a good video device. I have a 500GB external USB hard drive formatted as FAT32. It must be FAT32 for you to be able to connect it to your Xbox 360. Once connected to your Xbox 360 over USB you can watch many video types. I’ve been using Handbrake to convert my DVD movies to M4V video files. I’m using Handbrake’s Apple TV Take 2 settings with 2-Pass. Then I transfer the video files to the Movie folder on the external hard drive.

I can easily select the hard drive from the Xbox 360 menu and play any movie or TV Show (Firefly) I have on it. And they look fantastic. You can also put image files on the drive and view them from the Xbox. I plan on getting a PS3 (maybe) by the end of this or beginning of next. The PS3 will also read this same drive connected over USB and play the same video files or view image files.

The Apple TV has been out for a year now and it’s one USB port currently serves no purpose. When I get an Apple TV I want to be able to connect my pre-existing 500GB external USB hard drive to it. And have it play the movie files I’ve already encoded. I am making sure to select Apple TV specific settings.

Why does it matter. Because I really like the idea of all my movies accessible from one location. This is taking time and effort to setup. It would be nice not to lose the effort when it comes to the Apple TV. If the Apple TV never supports external storage, the drive will remain connected to the Xbox 360 and will continue to be my main source for video content. I already rent more movies from Xbox Live than iTunes or TiVo.

“Apple, by the time I get an Apple TV could you enable external storage through the USB port? And make sure it can read FAT32 so I don’t have to reformat and transfer all of my video files.”

In a previous article of mine I describe a new type of subscription service. It was more of a try before you buy solution.

I believe that Apple can have a plan to start a subscription based service for music. But unlike all of the comments about how people don’t want to rent music, this is more like XM Radio. Imagine paying a small monthly fee to Apple in exchange for unlimited listening to many channels of music. I don’t think the service will work if Apple doesn’t automatically make channels get music for their particular genre. Nearly identical to the way that XM has an 80’s channel. It would need to be similar to a radio station.

Apple would need to differentiate between renting music and a music station with many different channels. All songs are purchasable, the channels only play songs that you can buy. Unlike radio where you listen to what they want to play, with The iTunes Station you pick the channels you want to listen to and you may even have options to filter it specifically to your tastes. For instance, I like 80’s music, but only from about 84-89.

Apple probably already had something like this in mind and the newest iPods and iPhone are fully capable of playing music channels from The iTunes Station.

I would certainly consider trying it to see or hear rather some new music. Since I listen to mostly my own music instead a radio stations I’m sure I miss out on songs I would buy.

You can take this a step further and Apple could provide The iTunes Station for free with advertisements between songs just like a regular radio station. They could also provide this service over the internet as an internet radio station. There would be a ticker tape that could be clicked on taking you to the iTunes track in the iTunes Store for purchasing. How would they benefit? They would focus on playing music you don’t already own (when local to your machine). This way if you hear something you want to buy, click a Buy button while the song is playing from The iTunes Station and you own it. There are several models that could be used for this type of service, I describe just two of them.

The key for Apple is to remove the perception of renting music. Presenting it as a radio station (WAPL The Apple) will accomplish that.

I have a long and varied relationship with routers. I have always sold the model I have for the model I want. This includes my first router which wasn’t wireless. I’ve gone through all the brands and price ranges. I have sold my current Apple Airport Extreme Gigabit to make way for my new Apple Time Capsule 1TB. Apple’s Time Capsule is in fact an Airport Extreme with a built-in hard drive. The purpose of this device is for backups.

I had originally bought my Airport Extreme with the idea that I would be able to connect a HD to it and use Time Machine to backup. Unfortunately that feature didn’t make it into Time Machine or an Airport Extreme update, leaving myself and few others slightly disappointed. I’m not going to claim to know why it didn’t make it into the feature set. No big deal, I’ve sold the Airport Extreme and have what I want, wireless backups. Time Capsule is that solution.

I’ve had it for several days now and it appears to work effortlessly. I could have connected my computer directly to the Time Capsule so my first backup would have run very fast but I wanted to see how well it would do wirelessly. My MacBook doesn’t have 802.11N so I was backing up over 802.11G. I have approximately 160GB of data to backup. My wife has a MacBook with 802.11N and she had 80GB of data to backup. If you option-click the Airport icon in your Menu Bar you will see your Transmit Rate. Mine was 54 while Karen’s was 130. Karen’s computer took 8 hours to do it’s initial backup of 80GB. My computer took 36 hours to do it’s initial backup of 160GB.

The hardest part was not taking my computer anywhere for a whole day while it backed up. Now that the backups are done, incremental backups happen without me even noticing. Karen’s Transmit Rate would have been 300 if I didn’t have 802.11B/G items connected to the Time Capsule. Even at a reduced rate of 130, her MacBook was backing up more than twice as fast as mine.

The Apple Time Capsule works exactly the same way the Apple Airport Extreme with a hard drive connected does, except you can’t use Time Machine with the Airport Extreme to backup. That so far is the one feature that makes it better. And that one feature works very well.

My recommendation is to go with the Time Capsule for your wireless Time Machine backups. I went with the Time Capsule 1TB model but there is also the Time Capsule 500GB model if you don’t need the extra space.

UPDATE 03-19-2008: It appears as though several updates released today by Apple brings the aforementioned backup feature to Airport Extreme. That means you can use an Airport Extreme with a connected USB hard drive to backup your computer with Time Machine. Thanks for the updates Apple.

Someone ever tries to kill you, you try to kill em’ right back.

Save The Internet

I’m torn because I consider myself a Republican, but McCain doesn’t understand Net Neutrality and may allow telco to screw us, again. Ron Paul has a chance (small I know) but I’m concerned about how deep his Libertarian views go. Not a fan of the Clinton Machine. And that’s all I get to pick from. If I look at the overall picture and not pick on one individual issue I think I might just go with Barack Obama.

I own a black “incase” iPhone case which leaves the screen exposed. This is a concern since I wear it on my side. That led me to get the “POWER SUPPORT” crystal film static cling protection. It covers the screen against scratches.

The other day I was at a restaurant and as I moved to the right out of someone’s way I hit the screen of my iPhone against the very sharp edge of a chair. I immediately knew I caused damage because of how hard I hit the chair. I looked down to confirm the damage and I was correct.

Below are two images to show the damage caused. I hit the chair so hard it bounced and hit the screen twice.

Later on that evening I lifted up the corner of the “POWER SUPPORT” crystal film static cling to see what kind of damage the actual glass received. To my surprise the glass was completely undamaged. The static cling took all of the damage. So I went out and bought another set of the “POWER SUPPORT” crystal film static cling and replaced the damaged one on my iPhone.

I can easily recommend purchasing the “POWER SUPPORT” static cling (crystal or anti-glare) for your iPhone, especially if the screen is exposed.

Visit www.powersupportusa.com or pick them up from your local Apple Store like I did.

I don’t read the spoilers online or go looking for upcoming information about shows because I know it would ruin it for me.

I’m the only person I know that didn’t know Arnold was a good guy in T2. That’s why it was so great. I hate it when that feeling is ruined.

But sometimes some things just come to me. I recently saw the promos for the new episodes of LOST.

If you can remember, all of the LOST episodes were suppose to be from 2004, except for one. That one episode was from the future, but what future.

This got me thinking last night that the new season will show the characters not from 2004 but from 2008 (or what’s considered to be now).

This means that some of the characters got off of the island for 3 years and now plan to go back. It also means that those who stayed will have 3 years of back-story on the island.

This is an awesome concept. It makes me wonder if the future episode was from 2007 and they are back on the island now or if it’s from now and they want to get beck on the island.

This will also explain why Walt is so tall and older. It could mean that Sun’s baby is 2 years old and Claire’s baby is 3 years old.

I’m seriously looking forward to the new season.

It’s the 9th day of 2008 and every day this year I’ve been awake till 4AM. I think the Holidays screwed me up.

Today I had my first early morning appointment which I hope will help to get me back on schedule.

Of course even my normal schedule had me up till 2AM.

There will be several ways to watch iTunes Movie Rentals assuming the rumors are true.

First and foremost the movies will be rented from the iTunes Store. So you can watch it on your computer.

But how do you watch it on your TV? A couple of ways, first would be the Apple TV. It connects to your TV and you can tell it to download all new content on your computer.
The second way would be if you have and new iPhone, iPod touch, iPod nano or iPod classic. You would sync your movie rentals to one of these devices and with the use of a special $50 Apple Composite AV Cable or Apple Component AV Cable you can connect all of these devices your your television. You can even buy a special Universal Dock if you want to control the playback with the Apple Remote.

I have an iPhone, the Composite AV Cable and the Universal Dock for watching content from my iPhone on my TV. I looks quite good with the videos I’ve tried.

My predictions for the January 15th 2008 MacWorld Expo Keynote presentation by Steve Jobs:
1. New less expensive Apple TV, I’m guessing around $150. This hasn’t been in the rumors at all it just makes sense to me.
2. New hi-end Apple TV with 1080p output and 5.1 audio, DVD (Blu-Ray upgradable). Possible combining of the Mac mini and Apple TV.
3. Movie Rentals.
4. New MacBook Pros. Redesigned.
5. New MacBook Pro to replace the un-replaced 12″ PowerBook.
6. New Apple Universal Remote.
7. New MacBook that has built-in 3G network from AT&T, that way it’s connected from everywhere.
8. New Apple displays with HDMI. Easily connect to Apple TV
9. New iTunes 8 after the show.
10. iPhone update with new features never been announced.

We’ll probably hear about Starbucks, Microsoft Office 2K8 with Roz Ho, AT&T Pres about 3G and the show will end with musical talent (possibly a black male).

Today I celebrate 16 years of marriage. It seems like a lot but I know it’s not.

In a recent MacWorld article about the release of Quicken Online they have clearly stated it runs in Flash. Then they go on to say that it will run on an iPhone.

But iPhones can’t run Flash, I know. Also revealing about the article is that Quicken Online will be released exactly one week before Steve Jobs will give the MacWorld Expo Keynote.

My assumption is that Steve and Co. will announce Flash for the iPhone. Perfectly logical, I know.

My wife caught this one while we were watching the most recent episode of Pushing Daisies (Corpsicle).

If you forward into the episode, the scene after the commercial break starts out with a Winter scene of a street.

When Karen saw this she said “That’s the same street from Groundhog Day”. Upon further investigation it wasn’t just the street, it was the exact scene from Groundhog Day. There is someone shoveling snow on the left side of the street and someone walking down the sidewalk on the right side of the street. The Pushing Daisies scene has the walker just past the yellow house while the Groundhog Day scene has the walker at the end of the block farther away.

At 28 minutes 10 seconds (without commercials) the image below was captured from the 2007 Pushing Daisies episode Corpsicle.
The clip doesn’t have any relevance to the show except for the snow.

At 1 hour 36 minutes and 05 Seconds the image below was captured from the 1993 movie Groundhog Day.
This clip is in front of the actual Bed and Breakfast used in the Movie.

I wonder how many other people noticed? Pushing Daisies Forum Post.

I purchased my Xbox Live Starter Pack on 9/20/2002 for $49.95. I remember receiving it not to long after. It came with some cool stuff, at least I thought it was at the time. It came with a t-shirt that read “I’ve got great hands”, headset and adapter, orange memory card, carrying case and beta games. I continued to receive a few Beta Disks over the next few weeks.

I signed up with the gamertag “thexboxjedi”. I found that referring to myself as an Xbox Jedi gave people the impression I was good. It made me a target which didn’t help because I wasn’t that good, but I love to play. So I changed it to “themacjedi” shortly after the Xbox 360 came out.

My 5 year experience with Xbox Live has been awesome. I have a few friends on Live that joined because of me. I played games online with my Mac before I had Live but it wasn’t no where near as cool. Being able to talk to all of the players is a fantastic thing. There are always going to be people who you don’t want to hear and Live handles that.

The new Live with the 360 is a significant improvement. I enjoy it every day.

Here are few links to bring yourself up to date on Pushing Daisies if you’re not already familiar with the show. IMDB Wikipedia ABC

Digby is Ned’s dog and the first living thing Ned ever brought back to life. Ned at the age of 9 years, 27 weeks, 6 days and 3 minutes old learned that touching something dead once equals life, touch it again and it’s back to being dead.

Ned was fortunate to have learned this before touching Digby a second time. Therefore Digby is alive and well in Ned’s adult life now 19 years, 34 weeks, 1 day, 59 minutes later. He just can’t touch him.

The plot of the show is based around Ned’s love for someone he made alive again. That someone is Chuck and they can never touch. Or can they?

Theory #1
My first theory is that at the end of season one Digby and Ned will touch accidentally but Digby will not die (Season One Cliffhanger). The end of season one will put Ned and Digby at over 20 years from the first touch. This will lead Ned to wonder how long after he touches something can he touch it again and it not return to being dead. Wanting to know how long before he and Chuck can touch again he will probably setup an experiment with many dead insects, choosing those with the longest life span. Using predetermined times to touch the insects again, after an hour, a day, a week and a year bringing us all the way to the end of the second season (Season Two Cliffhanger).

Is 20 years the magic number? Will it be 20 years before Ned and Chuck can touch?

Theory #2
My second theory is based on Digby being a Golden Retriever. The average lifespan of a Golden Retriever is 13 years. Digby was 3 years, 2 weeks, 6 days, 5 hours and 9 minutes old when he died so today he would be over 22 years old. That leads us to the conclusion that Ned’s first touch of life alters the natural life span of whatever he touched. This could lead Ned into another experiment. Only this time Ned gathers some insects with very short lifespans. After touching them and bringing them back to life he waits to see how much longer they live past their natural lifespan.

Today I received my first ever Cease and Desist letter. I assume that Amanda’s attorney were simply doing their job and found my Amanda Congdon Special t-shirt on my CafePress store.

I gave a brief explanation of the permission I had received and once they confirm that information I’m sure they will move on to real unauthorized users.

The Xbox 360 Chatpad comes in the Xbox 360 Messenger Kit with a headset. The headset is better than the previous headsets because the controller is inline. As an owner of the wireless headset and 3 of the previous headsets, the new headset is inconsequential.

Let’s start with the Chatpad Positives:
To go from having to use the virtual keyboard to an actual keyboard is fantastic. When pressing keys you get audible feedback from the TV. All of the keys that would need are there, including a few you may never use. It fix snugly onto your controller and feels very solid. It has a headset jack on the front to plug your new headset into. The keys light up for dark room use.

Now the Chatpad Negatives:
The Chatpad is designed with the white controller in mind. Therefore when attaching it to the new Black, Blue, Pink or Halo controller it looks very poorly thought out. For example, with such a small keyboard footprint they should have designed the casing with the grey color most of the controllers have and made the keyboard white or shiny (like the Guide button) with black letters. This would have increased the contrast significantly. I find I have to focus on the keyboard more than normal because of the current contract. It’s difficult to read and I have 20/15 vision.

Chatpad Wrapup:
It’s great to have a keyboard. I’m looking forward to the next version that might be a neutral color with a high contrast keyboard.

Additional Thoughts:
I believe the Chatpad was designed for an upcoming Xbox 360 Web Browser. They are marketing it as a Messenger solution but I can’t find people who use Messenger.

My previous article is about the iPhone connecting to my TV. This would give me the ability to watch TV shows and Movies from the iTunes store on my television.

But why not take it one step further? Apple has already given iTunes similar functionality to that of Sony’s LocationFree. With an Apple TV you can connect to different iTunes enabled computers to stream audio and video. And you can stream audio from iTunes to different Airport Express (Airtunes) routers. That indicates that data flow can be both directions. Apple TV pulls data from your iTunes enabled computers and iTunes pushes data to the Airport Express.

Apple, give me the ability to browse iTunes media on my local network with my iPhone and the iPod touch.

Let’s say that I have an iPhone (and I do) or iPod touch and I want to view something on an iTunes enabled computer. I wake my iPhone or iPod touch and click the SHARED button (Apple already uses the SHARED directory in iTunes when it detects other iTunes on the same network). After pressing the SHARED button I would be presented with a list of all iTunes enabled computers. Upon selecting one I would be presented with the options to choose between the different types of media: Music, Movies, TV Shows, Podcasts and so on.

I think this is similar in functionality to the way a PSP can view media from LocationFree or a PS3.

This would give me the ability to watch or listen to anything on any of my iTunes enabled computers on my local network. This would work the same way if I was at a friend’s house and he was sharing from iTunes.

Or what about the new deal with Starbucks. Imagine going into Starbucks and being able to listen in full to the same music that’s being played instead of 30 second clips of the previously played songs.

I doubt I’m suggesting something that those Apple Ninjas haven’t already thought of but I want to go ahead and say I want it. Apple likes to claim they think of stuff we want before we even know we want it. Most of the time they really do give me something I hadn’t thought of or knew I needed but when I have it I can’t do without it.

This time I want something before Apple told me I wanted it.