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Visual Studio QuickOpen

On the Mac, I love TextMate, particularly the Command + t shortcut to quickly go to a file. At work, I spend all day in Visual Studio and I've been wanting something similar for it for ages.

I finally found it: Quick Open for Visual Studio 2008. So far, it works great. This may not happen for everyone, but there's a gotcha to installing it: make sure to let it install in the default file location. I tried to customize the folder it installed to, and VS2008 never recognized it. Also, you gotta make sure VS2008 is completely shut down. After closing it, open Task Manager and make sure you don't see devenv.exe running still. If it's there, kill it.

Filed under: tech

Related entries:

June 5, 2009 - Visual Studio QuickOpen
March 21, 2009 - The Browser Is the Operating System
Jan. 26, 2009 - Tips: HTML
Dec. 26, 2008 - Tips: Python
Dec. 23, 2008 - Tips: Javascript

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Words To Golf AND Live By

I played golf last weekend, and did a little better than usual. Still sucked, but the wheels didn't fall off like they often do. I also just read Seven Simple Steps to Realizing Your Dreams and it struck me that last weekend when I played, I had a gameplan and stuck to it, and things worked out fairly well.

I love golf, because it's you vs. a stupid little ball. I like solitary sports where you interact with a ball or machine. Guess that's why I like dicking with computers too. In golf, I alternate between sweet-talking the ball, and cussing it out (same with my computers!), but it's definitely more of a war for me than a love affair. I'm in no way the first guy to play the "golf as a metaphor for life" card, and none of these ideas are original or revolutionary, but I'll lay 'em out for my own record keeping if nothing else.

Before You Get Started: take all the shit out of your pockets, turn off the phone, and get ready to play the game sans distractions. In the game of life, what things are these sorts of diversions that have nothing to do with what you're trying to accomplish? I've got a neat iPhone app that caddies for you, but I left it in the bag 'cause it's a gimmick and just complicates things. Also, are you hungover? Are you gonna freeze your nads off 'cause you didn't bring a jacket? Do you hate the guys you're playing with? I'm not saying things need to be ideal all the time, but are you setting yourself up for failure?

Step One - Survey the Scene: stand away from the ball and figure out what you need to do. Where's the danger? Sand traps on the right? Woods off to the left? Wind gonna shorten your shot? What club will get you that distance? In life, this would be stepping back and taking stock of your situation figuring out where you wanna go. What exactly are you trying to accomplish, and what things do you need to be cognizant of to make it happen? I like to actually imagine the plan being carried out and watch it happen a couple times in my mind. Be specific about where the ball needs to go. Mentally rehearsing is important.

Step Two - Work Out the Details: stand next to the ball and get your stance and grip right. Lately, I tend to move any leaves or sticks near the ball that might distract me while I'm setting up. I hate to rare back to hit the ball and then see something and think "ham sandwich!!" and smack it in the water. This phase is for focusing on execution. You've made your plan, and whether it's the best plan or not, you commit to it and that part's out of your mind - it's set in stone. If not, you gotta step back away from the ball and do it all over again.

Execution's key here, but don't get lost in the details. Take a couple practice swings, imagining the ball doing what you intend it to, but then step up and whack the ball. Practice swings are great, but taking 20 of 'em is silly, and counterproductive. There's also no sense in doing any of this if you're waiting on the guys ahead of you to clear out. Doing so dissipates your concentration and mojo.

Postmortem - did it work? We hope it did, but you can't hit 'em in the hole all the time. What failed? Did you plan great but bone the swing? Did you smack the shit out of the ball but not account for the wind or the terrain? If everything worked out as intended, tell yourself that if Mr. T and MacGyver had a kid, he still wouldn't be as badass as you. Then move on to the next shot.

For me, each shot is a mini round of golf, and each round of golf is part of a larger whole of the journey to get better. I'm just now grasping this, but it's the small details that add up to winning. A good shot here, a good strategy there, and you're shaving strokes off and getting ahead. Life seems to behave along these lines too, where you should always have an aim and a plan, but know that you'll rarely hit it 100% dead on. But you're preparing yourself for it to happen. Getting closer and closer, and then they go in once in awhile - and life or golf is a lot of fun.

Extras - these things are crucial to the game (or life), but aren't necessarily part of the play itself:

Sharpening the Saw - you gotta take some time to practice and hone your skills. You focus on the details and minutia and try to work on your flaws and tendencies. We all have 'em - they can either mar your game, or you can minimize and be aware of them.
Gear - it's too easy to get hung up on the equipment. It deserves some thought, but gear is gear. If you're playing at the rarified level of a pro golfer, gear is more of a concern, and you can afford to be picky and sweat the details, but for most of us, it really doesn't matter that much. Strategy and skill are what most of us need to focus on.
The Journey - it'd be great if you set out to play good golf, or run a business successfully, and it was a nice linear line moving upward. Doesn't happen that way though. Usually you have a big spike up initially, then it comes slamming down. You may have a valley for awhile, and then start inching your way back up. You'll probably inch a little higher than your previous peak, but you'll settle back down into a valley again, and this stairstep pattern repeats itself. I find this is true in golf, life, marriage, business, etc.
It's easy to hit the valley and get aggravated, thinking you're not going anywhere, but don't buy it. You're just laying the groundwork and getting the mechanics down. Putting in whatever infrastructure is necessary for the next step up, similar to the way houses or buildings are built where each phase depends on the one preceding it. Recognize how the journey plays out and embrace the valleys as well as the peaks.

Filed under: life

Related entries:

March 30, 2009 - Words To Golf AND Live By
March 9, 2009 - YZ-125 Top End Rebuild
Feb. 19, 2009 - The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree
Feb. 1, 2009 - Overnight Success
Jan. 26, 2009 - SuperMemo and MasterMind

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The Browser Is the Operating System

It occurred to me a couple days ago, that the bottom right corner of my browser is starting to look a lot like the task bar of my windows machine.

Then it occurred to me that the browser is the operating system. Pretty much everything I do is in the browser. I could switch from Unix to Mac to Winderrs and it really wouldn't slow me down that much. If it hasn't moved to the browser, it's probably trying to right now (Photoshop/editing). The only things I can think of that really would have a hard time being in the browser might be audio and video work. But hell, if bandwidth makes some great leap and transferring 4 gigs of data becomes lightning fast, who knows?

I've been kinda keeping tabs on Bespin, a web IDE for sites. The idea's cool, and offers some huge advantages for shared code scenarios. I also hear that the newer versions of Firefox will have some Ubiquity goodies built into the address bar. The address bar already made huge leaps when FF3 came out with Awesome Bar, but sprinkling in some Ubiquity's gonna turn it into a command-line interface. URLs are interfaces too, and the address bar's only gonna get stronger.

There you have it. In 10 years, nobody's gonna notice what OS you use. It'll all be on the web, and you'll use some portable dumb terminal to access it.

Filed under: tech

Related entries:

June 5, 2009 - Visual Studio QuickOpen
March 21, 2009 - The Browser Is the Operating System
Jan. 26, 2009 - Tips: HTML
Dec. 26, 2008 - Tips: Python
Dec. 23, 2008 - Tips: Javascript

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YZ-125 Top End Rebuild

Today I rebuilt the top-end of my 1996 YZ-125. Compresssion got awful and it wouldn't even run unless I held the throttle damn near wide open. I thought I was gonna have to ditch it in the woods at Wambaw a year ago. So today I yanked it all apart, and took a few pics while doing it so I figured I'd write it up while it was fresh in my head.

You pretty much have to take the entire bike apart to get at the cylinder head, so I started by pulling all the plastic off, then the air filter box, then the carb, then draining the radiator and disconnecting the hoses near the motor. The combination of old stale premix fuel, and the antifreeze made a neat looking cocktail in the jar.

Here's the bike pretty much stripped down, minus the expansion chamber, which still had to come off. Tip: keep the screws for each thing you take off with the thing, so you won't be left scratching your head when it comes time to put it all back together.

Here's a closeup of the cylinder head. You might as well throw a new spark plug in while you're fiddling with it. For the '96 YZ-126, it's an NGK BR9EG, gap is .19-.24

The cylinder was kind of a bitch to get off, but a few persuasive taps with a rubber mallet softened it up.

Here's the carb. It's a carb. Not much to see. Great that they're so small and compact. I guess everything's going to fuel-injection these days, but my heart still loves a simple 2-stroke and carb. Simple, compact, powerful as all hell...

Here's the cylinder, cleaned up a little. I usually like to clean all the parts that come off. The poor man's parts washer is a can of brake cleaner and a shot of compressed air.

Here's the new piston installed. It's such a cute little guy. My kids weren't impressed with such a small, boring part taking up all of my day. Notice the rags - always plug up these holes so nothing falls down in the engine. You will hate life if something does!

Here's the head all put back together. New spark plug, fresh antifreeze.

Carb and air box put back on, expansion chamber and muffler. Double-check all the hoses, clamps, etc.

Gas tank on, seat, rear fender... Starting to look like a dirtbike again.

Aaanndd VIII-ola! Starts on the first kick, and sounds like a million bucks.

I usually use Spectro SX, but I had some Yamaha R2 handy, and only wanted to mix up a gallon, so I looked up some crap about ratios and mixing and came up with a nugget:

1 gallon = 128oz. You take the ounces of gas and divide by the ratio you want to get how much 2-stroke oil to add, so for me and 32:1, a one-gallon can equals 128oz of gas divided by 32 = 4oz of oil to mix in.

Filed under: life motorcycles

Related entries:

March 30, 2009 - Words To Golf AND Live By
March 9, 2009 - YZ-125 Top End Rebuild
Feb. 19, 2009 - The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree
Feb. 1, 2009 - Overnight Success
Jan. 26, 2009 - SuperMemo and MasterMind

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The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree

For the 3 or 4 folks out there who read this site, sorry I haven't updated in awhile. I have a couple half-posts written, but can't seem to eek 'em out. So I'll throw something out I've been kicking around lately:

I'm beginning to theorize that by the time you're in your late 20s to to early 30s, you'll pretty much be just like your parents. The prevailing thought is that people are blank slates, or nearly so, and if given the right schooling and friends etc., they'll grow up to be President or astronauts or whatever they want. I submit that rather than being a piece of clay that's molded by life early on, people are more like plastic, that might bend in early life, but eventually return back to natural form.

This would mean that nature plays a larger part in a person than we might think, or want to admit. All I've got is anecdotal evidence - the folks around me that I know, who basically would up like their parents. Plenty of friends and family are even working with their parents, or doing the same job their parents do. Might be a matter of convenience in that they were just around it and it was there for them when nothing else cropped up, but a lot of folks I know had plenty of feet in other avenues and careers in life, only to eventually move to their parents' field of work. Gives a bit of creedence to the tradition of doing what your parents do.

I'm not saying people are incapable of changing, I'm just saying it's damn hard. It's probably more likely that a person's not gonna be that different from their folks - even if they've never really been around them.

The problem with this line of thinking is that it has awful consequences. You wind up aristoracy and "correct bloodlines", eugenics, social darwinism, and the lot. But I can't help seeing what I see, and connecting the dots. If I'm full of crap, hit me in the comments. One good thing about being right on this one is that it'd give you a huge leg up on life. At this point in America, a person has tons of choices of who to be and what to do - knowing that you'll be pretty much like your folks narrows the field a good bit, and might save you from going down a path in life that's at odds with who you'll wind up being. If I had known I'd wind up like my dad and wanna live in the country with a decent piece of land and be left alone, I'd have called my shots a little differently.

I'm tired and The Mentalist is on. Buenos nachos.

Filed under: life

Related entries:

March 30, 2009 - Words To Golf AND Live By
March 9, 2009 - YZ-125 Top End Rebuild
Feb. 19, 2009 - The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree
Feb. 1, 2009 - Overnight Success
Jan. 26, 2009 - SuperMemo and MasterMind

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Overnight Success

I'm wrestling these days with the "jack of all trades, master of none" idea. On the one hand, if you're interested in poetry, drag racing, architecture and antique clocks, people would say you're a Renaissance man. But you'd also have your fingers in so many pies that you'd never really master any of them. On the other, if you devote everything youv'e got to just one thing, you'd be the top dog and a ninja at it, but you'd be one-sided. I can't really focus on just one thing for decades - I'd go nuts.

I like to do, and know lots of things, but I don't like the thought of just being average or below average at them. I guess I can play a mean Trivial Pursuit or Jeopardy because of it, but that doesn't really pay the bills.

Having just finished Born Standing Up - A Comic's Life by Steve Martin, I was mostly struck by how his overnight success was anything but. He was out there for years, touring, tweaking his act, getting his ass kicked at awful clubs and crowds of Japanese tourists. Overnight success takes years.

So I come back with the quandary of staying focused without getting bored. I've been playing guitar for almost 20 years, and I love it dearly, but if I had to do it all day, every day, I'd get sick of it. But that's almost what you've gotta do if you wanna scale the the mountains of things like Recuerdos de la Alhambra. If you wanna master something, prepare for a long and arduous climb. Mastery is a good book if you're on such a journey and getting discouraged. I love how it lays out the idea of the initial quick ramp up, then a long and boring valley where seemingly no progress is made, and then the next ramp up. Certainly jives with what Steve Martin was talking about.

Filed under: life

Related entries:

March 30, 2009 - Words To Golf AND Live By
March 9, 2009 - YZ-125 Top End Rebuild
Feb. 19, 2009 - The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree
Feb. 1, 2009 - Overnight Success
Jan. 26, 2009 - SuperMemo and MasterMind

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Speeding Ticket Madness

From The 10 Biggest Injustices Against Motorists In October:

In recent weeks, officers have twice been photographed speeding past a camera and extending a middle finger, an act that police supervisors interpreted as a gesture of defiance.

***

The History of Rome in weekly podcasts. I just finished Born Standing Up, so this is next on the list.

Filed under: cars history

Related entries:

Jan. 28, 2009 - Speeding Ticket Madness
Jan. 23, 2009 - Diesel Electric Car
Dec. 16, 2008 - Toyota Holdin' It Down
Nov. 11, 2008 - Death and Taxes
Nov. 4, 2008 - Ranger

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SuperMemo and MasterMind

Great Wired article about never forgetting anything:

The failure of SuperMemo to transform learning uncannily repeats the earlier failures of cognitive psychology to influence teachers and students. Our capacity to learn is amazingly large. But optimal learning demands a kind of rational control over ourselves that does not come easily. Even the basic demand for regularity can be daunting. If you skip a few days, the spacing effect, with its steady march of sealing knowledge in memory, begins to lose its force. Progress limps. When it comes to increasing intelligence, our brain is up to the task and our technology is up to the task. The problem lies in our temperament.

This part's great too:

... I find myself thinking of a checklist Wozniak wrote a few years ago describing how to become a genius. His advice was straightforward yet strangely terrible: You must clarify your goals, gain knowledge through spaced repetition, preserve health, work steadily, minimize stress, refuse interruption, and never resist sleep when tired. This should lead to radically improved intelligence and creativity. The only cost: turning your back on every convention of social life. It is a severe prescription.

***

Elsewhere, some great info from Eben Pagan's blog on getting a MasterMind together:

We humans are programmed by everything that happens around us. We tend to be MOST programmed by what we see, hear, and experience others doing.
Not what we read, not what we think, not what we feel. We’re influenced by the OTHERS around us. We literally become those that we surround ourselves with.
Want to know how much a person makes per year? Find their five closest friends and average their incomes. That’s the answer.

I'm not quite sure whether to recommend Eben Pagan's site or not. If you Google him, you'll find out he's behind some Double Your Dating site under the name of David DeAngelo, and he's probably just a guy who's figured out a few ways to make a buck off folks on the internet. Picking up chicks and becoming a better person are natural enough desires, but I doubt a guy's motivation if he's hawking both things.

Filed under: life

Related entries:

March 30, 2009 - Words To Golf AND Live By
March 9, 2009 - YZ-125 Top End Rebuild
Feb. 19, 2009 - The Apple Doesn't Fall Far From the Tree
Feb. 1, 2009 - Overnight Success
Jan. 26, 2009 - SuperMemo and MasterMind

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Weekly Links 1/24/2008

Some of the better stuff I've come accross this week...

The Curious Case of Forrest Gump
If you only see one Forrest Gump remake this year, make it The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Who's Reading Your Cell's Text Messages?
Some guy set his Verizon text username to "null", so all null@vtext.com text messages (and it's alot) go to him.
The Fleet Foxes on SNL last week
Unsold cars fro around the world
These pics are really beautiful and artistic.
Is Chewbacca in my nightstand?

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Diesel Electric Car

Why is there no diesel-electric car? Trains have been using this technology for decades, but to my knowledge it hasn't shown up in passenger cars yet*.

Most hybrids out there fall into one of two categories: parallel hybrid, or mild hybrid. A parallel hybrid would use the electric motor to reverse, or move the car at low speeds, but if any kind of speed or acceleration is needed, the gas engine kicks in. The Prius falls into this category. A mild hybrid, just uses the electric motor to add some extra oomph to the engine, so you can use a smaller motor and save fuel. The Honda Civic and Insight fall into this category.

In both cases though, the gas engine is the main motivator, and to my line of thinking, you might as well just slap a turbo on a 3-cylinder engine if you're gonna basically make a car that's weak, except for when you need it.

Trains on the other hand (at least the diesel-electric ones), are driven by electric motors exclusively. This is called a series hybrid. They have a diesel engine** that simply drives a generator and that's all it does. The diesel engine can basically run at a nice comfortable speed the whole time to power the generator, and you really don't need to fiddle with batteries at all - you could use them if you wanted to, but the motors can get their juice from the generator directly, or a capacitor, and you wouldn't have to worry about the battery crapping out on you after X number of years. I can't quite figure out why we haven't seen this sort of hybrid in cars yet. There must be some penalty you pay for the double conversion of diesel energy to electric energy that just doesn't factor in for trains or really large vehicles. Maybe weight?

The Tesla is the only electric/hybrid car that I find remotely interesting, but it's all battery. It's definitely cool that you'd never have to hit the gas station, but charging it up is no mean feat, and the range is around 200 miles on a single charge. That's plenty of range for most folks, and I'm sure battery technology will improve rapidly in the coming years, but if that sucker was powered by a small diesel genrator, rather than a battery, you'd be running off electricity all the time, with all the fun torque and characteristics of an electric motor, but your range wouldn't be limited since you could hit any gas station to keep the generator happy.

* The Chevy Volt is apparently a series hybrid, so we'll see how that works out. I'm reserving judgement on that one until I know a little more and see some real-world tests. I've got a natural distaste for most Chevy engineering, but every once in awhile they churn out something like a Grand National or Syclone, so you never know.

**: I'm using diesel as the fuel of choice, but gas would work too. Diesel fuel's a lot less refined than gas, and should cost a lot less (that's something else I don't understand, but that's for another post), but diesel engines are generally simpler and more reliable than their gas counterparts. There's a reason it's used for most generators and trains. Plus, you can use a variety of fuels in a diesel, so you've got some flexibility there.

Filed under: cars

Related entries:

Jan. 28, 2009 - Speeding Ticket Madness
Jan. 23, 2009 - Diesel Electric Car
Dec. 16, 2008 - Toyota Holdin' It Down
Nov. 4, 2008 - Ranger
Nov. 4, 2008 - Car Repair

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