I switched from Spam Karma to Akismet, so hopefully captcha and waiting for posts to be moderated are a thing of the past….please feel free to test it. I’m so sick of comment spam.
September 1, 2006
July 26, 2005
Just the facts
Have you ever wondered how many people read this site? Maybe what nations these people are in?
I doubt any of you lie awake in suspense, but I’ve always loved the stats that I get from webalizer. I had it on the computer in California, but I just now got it working here (just now meaning November 2004, when this post was started).
Anyway, there is still some interesting things you can check out…
Josh, if you see potential to abuse the site from this info…could you let me know? I’ll take it down, but I’d like to leave it if I could.
July 7, 2005
Gmap Pedometer
One of the coolest google map hacks that I’ve come across so far is the Gmaps Pedometer. Basically, it is a way for you to create routes on Google Maps and figure out the distances of those routes. It is great to figure out how far of a walk something is, or to create a route of a certain length (I created a 1 mile running route). Also, you can switch between the maps and satellite images to see what the route looks like. Here is my favorite running path, or my Mom’s favorite walking path.
We’ve got new phones on the way!
Welcome to 2005, Matt and Rhya Miller. Here’s your phone. You won’t be needing these bag phones anymore.
Ok, so maybe our current phones aren’t quite as bad as bag phones, but it was definitely time for an upgrade. I was between the Motorola V710 and the LG VX8000, and I spent a lot of time looking over the pros and cons of each.
In the end, I picked the V710 because there are a lot of hacks out there for it, it has a transflash card, and it has bluetooth (which needs to be hacked, but can be made to have pretty close to full functionality). However, there were a couple gripes that I was willing to live with: The flip had to be open to use the speakerphone, the camera was pretty blurry, and it didn’t have photo ID on the outside of the phone.
So, armed with this information, we went to go get our new phones. However, we had procrastinated just long enough, and Verizon had released the e815 that day! It is just like the v710, but has addressed the concerns that I had above and added a ton of new features, such as a 1000 entry contact list with up to 6 numbers for each contact (Sorry to you if you don’t make it in my top 1000). Unfortunately, they had sold out of them at the store, so I had to call Verizon and order them. But, they should be here tomorrow…
Best part of the whole thing? It’s only going to end up being $50 out of our pocket for both phones.
June 28, 2005
For those with iPod envy…
Josh Schulz has crafted a nifty little script that will convert all of your iTunes Playlists (even the smart ones)into good ol’ standard MP3 Playlists (M3u format). What does this mean?
For those of you that have rio music players, or iriver, or any other standard-compliant mp3 player, you can use the resulting playlists to synch up all (except songs purchased from the iTunes music store) your music to your mp3 player, and enjoy all of the benefits of iTunes management (such as smart playlists).
An example:
Rhya, who has a 256MB rio cali, can create a smart playlist that contains any song with an artist containing “Petty” or anything with a genre of “Oldies”, etc., etc. Then, she can limit that playlist to choosing songs out of all of that music at random to create a list of songs that doesn’t go over 256MB. We set Josh’s script to run every morning, and when she wants to jump on the elliptical, she has a bunch of songs that she knows are good, but are constantly changing ready in her MP3 player.
Awesome. Since Josh has the API down, maybe I could request a script that I think would make some peoples’ lives easier:
Anyone that deals with iTunes knows that deleting songs is a pain in the butt. Seriously. You have to right-click on the song, pick something like “show original file…”, delete the file, then right click on the song again, then select “clear”. This sucks.
Imagine this. Josh creates a script that if a song exists in the Library with an unchecked box (this attribute must be at the Library level, not simply unchecked in a playlist), the song is deleted, and the entry cleared from the Library. I could go through my music, uncheck things that I wanted deleted, and wait for the scheduled job to run.
I’m sure this would be a piece of cake for someone that has such a command of the API (hint hint).
June 22, 2005
Del.icio.us and Linkblogging – Take Two
To most of you who know me, I tend to be a pretty quick-adopter of new technology. However, I’m here to make a confession. I’m actually pretty slow. What am I talking about? My buddy Josh tried to clue me in months ago to this social bookmarking website called delicious. Basically, you can create bookmarks on this site, tag them with whatever relevance they have to you, and access them from anywhere.
Big deal right? I know that is what I thought when I first heard about it from Josh. However, I totally missed the one HUGE feature: It creates RSS feeds of any lists that you create. So now, if I want a media file to end up on my iPod, I just mark it mmlisten, and it eventually shows up (by the way, if you want me to hear something, just mark it with that and I’ll get it). Read discussions here and here for more details. Or, if I want something to show up on the linkblog at the right, boom, I just mark it mmlinkblog. And even more beautiful…..it makes sharing seamless. Want to know what I think is cool in the fitness arena? It is updated real-time with any links I come across. Or, to see anything that I’m messing around with, go here. Of course, you can pull down the RSS feed of any of this with any aggregator (like Bloglines).
I do wish there was some way that I could through some comentary around what I collect over there, as some stuff I keep around to try, then find out it sucks. Josh has a great idea about this on his site. Check it out. For now, I’ll maybe just tag some things with adjectives, like sucks. You won’t be able to tell why I don’t like it, but it is a step in the right direction, till Josh gets over being lazy and writes his RSS CMS.
May 29, 2005
Linkblog
One thing that I’ve wanted to do for a while is try to maintain a linkblog. Basically, I just wanted to browse the sites that I normally go to, and if I see a particularly interesting topic, I’d like to share it. Not a big hubub with its own story or anything. Well, I was always to busy or lazy to implement my own solution to this, but now, someone has done it for me! So, I’ve implemented the plugin for wordpress, and you can see my links in all their glory to the right (or you can subscribe to the rss feed).
By the way, I’m a copycat. Josh Schulz of the Schulzone had this first.
May 25, 2005
My Blogroll
I’m not quite sure how I’m going to implement this in this site yet (or if I will). Between the Linkblog, and a static list of sites that I link to, I’m not sure how much more appetite I have to litter the site with links. However, this is my Bloglines subscription list. If you can recommend any more, I’m definitely open.
April 20, 2005
Lil’ Outage
Somebody (I’m not sure we’ll ever know who) forgot to renew the domain registry for mattandrhya.com. But, it was quickly remedied, and now mattandrhya.com is safe for another two years. I renewed with Active Domain, because moving it to another registry seemed like a pain in the butt. I’m thinking of doing a major overhaul of the site, which will hopefully spark my interest to post a bit more.
The problem is, I’m pretty much into poker and the cubs right now, and there are plenty of blogs on those subjects.
February 21, 2005
My parents are geeks
It’s true. I’m not the only geek in the family anymore. Okay, you be the judge.
1.) They have a broadband DSL connection (not so geeky on its own).
2.) They are running linux.
3.) They are running Debian linux.
4.) They are running Debian linux with an SSH server.
5.) They have a gmail account.
Just wait till they start compiling their own kernels and preaching the virtues of the command line. Drop them a message at their new address vernonmylastname@gmail.com (replace mylastname with the obvious). Welcome to geekdom, your membership card is in the mail!
Okay, here is my little side comment: Linux, especially debian, is the perfect way to help the members of your family have a broadband connection without the worries of spyware, adware and viruses. It’s a rock-solid OS with most of the features that normal people use (Office Suite, E-mail Reader, web browser, instant messenger, etc.), with an easy update system (apt) that you can help them with remotely (via ssh).
