ƒ(billwil)

Quick Take #7-A Day at the Phx Zoo.

Bill Williams — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 09:50:47 -0700

On Saturday we took the kids to the Phx Zoo to see a Zoo Member Preview of the new Komodo Dragon exhibit. Merek is a reptile freak, so we knew he would love it. I put together a Quick Take (my seventh) on the visit.

I've included some pictures in an album here as well. Click on the "View Full Album" link and hit "Slide show" Enjoy.

View Full Album

Halloween Comes

Bill Williams — Sun, 08 Nov 2009 21:19:12 -0700

The gateway to the holiday season has come and gone, so here are some of our pictures.

View Full Album

During pumpkin carving, Crystal made gourmet (and messy) caramel apples to get us in the spirit. The kids also got an impromptu fireworks show off of our patio roof. Someone was putting on a show north of us. No pics of the fireworks, though.

Speaking of pumpkins, carving cool pumpkins is becoming our thing, so here are the notables this year. For last years, check out this post on my main blog. Enjoy the Jack-O-Lanterns from the Williams' this year.


First up for the pumpkin fashion show is Trey's Sun Devil homage of Sparky + the ASU logo (two for one!)	Next up is Merek's dragon. Fierce looking, for sure.

Finally, we have Cayman's Werewolf. Scary...very scary.

Some Grand Cayman Diving

Bill Williams — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 12:00:00 -0700

Last month my wife, Crystal, and I took a whirlwind vacation with some of our extended family to several great diving destinations including Cayman, Roatan, Belize, Cozumel and Ft. Lauderdale. I've got a lot of video footage and some still photos from the trip, so I put together a little sample from Grand Cayman. More to follow.

We dove with Casey from Neptune Divers and it was fabulous. No big animals on our two dives this time, but the terrain on the wall was amazing, and the life around the wreck and reef we did on the second dive was fantastic. My sister, Brenda, shown here in this video a few times, was on her first dive as a certified scuba diver (see her using her arms? :)). Her husband, David, is featured here too, along with Crystal and I.

I'll also have a review/recap of our trip shortly. For now, here is a quick view into the underwater world of Grand Cayman, featuring their world class wall that dives into the abyss just off shore. Enjoy.

Wacky Hair Day

Bill Williams — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 16:26:58 -0700

Merek and Trey had a Wacky Hair Day at school today. This was them on their way out the door.

Just a Little Off the Top

Bill Williams — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 20:27:11 -0700

Here’s Trey, my youngest son. He smiles. A lot.

He had an interesting day yesterday. It seemed like most every other day at first, but some time after school and before I got home from work, Trey saw this in our bathroom.

Ignoring all logic and despite the use of this object by his mother for any haircuts or hair trimming that is done at home, Trey decided he wasn’t exactly sure what would happen if he turned this on and ran it through his hair. Being an inquisitive young man, he determined that this specific time in his life was the best time to figure out what would happen under those circumstances, so this was Trey shortly thereafter.

Not as much smiling. He does, however, now know what will happen when he turns that thing on and runs it across his scalp. As for the timing; two days before school pictures, and at a school that doesn’t allow caps to be worn. So, here is our smiling Trey now that mom had to try to even things out a little. This is how he will be immortalized in his 2nd Grade class pictures.

The smile is back. As for Mom and Dad? Well, we had a difficult time controlling our laughter so we wouldn’t make him feel too bad. Seriously, what would we do for laughs without kids?

A Morning Flight to Prescott

Bill Williams — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 17:01:52 -0700

Last Saturday I took a quick flight with a friend of mine who’s thinking about becoming a pilot. Some members of The Phoenix Pilot Group were headed up there that morning to have breakfast, and see some of the airplanes on display by Cessna, Cirrus, Piper, Beech, Diamond, and Mooney at the Prescott stop of the Arizona Aircraft Expo. My friend wanted to take a flight, and since this was going on, we thought we’d head up there to check it out.

The weather was sketchy here in the usually nice Phoenix area. For a few days we had a weather system passing through that brought a lot of moisture and unstable air. That meant humid mornings with lots of clouds and possible scattered thunderstorms in the afternoons. I had been following the weather, and when I woke up that morning I took a look outside, and sure enough, there was what looked like a couple of layers of clouds, some as low as 1500 feet from the ground. My weather briefing confirmed that, but it looked broken enough to get out, and the weather in Prescott was supposed to be better, so off to the airport we went. My youngest son, Trey, accompanied me as well.

After the pre-flight, we were off. My usual course of action to head north is to immediately open my flight plan on departure from Stellar Airpark in Chandler, AZ, and then quickly get over to Phoenix approach to request a northbound transition through the class Bravo airspace directly over Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. I did this, and quickly got a left 360 for spacing before being cleared into the airspace. The approach controller cleared me to transition over Sky Harbor (KPHX) at 5000 feet MSL. As I was climbing and approaching the transition, it became obvious that I wouldn’t be able to maintain Visual Flight Rules (VFR) and climb to 5000 feet. I contacted the controller and let him know that I was unable to comply with the request and maintain VFR. I told him that I could maintain 4000, and maybe go higher later, and he accepted that, and cleared me on the transition at 4000 feet. Later, I actually had to drop down to 3,500 ft to remain clear of clouds, and the controller was kind enough to coordinate my transition of Deer Valley’s (KDVT) class D airspace.

It turned out there were several layers of clouds that day, scattered at about 4000 feet, broken at about 6000 feet, and overcast at 8000 or so. Visibility was also terrible under those layers, which is very unusual for Phoenix. While flying the transition I probably only had about 8-10 miles of visibility. In contrast to what I normally fly in, which is 10 times that, this seemed rather limiting. My passenger actually asked me if I was concerned as we dodged clouds over Phoenix in poor visibility, and I thought for a second, and realized that I wasn’t really. We had many outs, and were on radar and in contact with Phoenix approach. Even if we couldn’t get out of the valley due to low clouds, or a thunderstorm in our way, we could have landed at half a dozen airports that were either in sight or would be in a few minutes if we flew toward them, including even PHX right below us. Also, I was still pretty confident that we would be able to climb out of the valley toward the better weather north of us.

It turned out I was right. After crossing over Deer Valley we were able to continue climbing and the low clouds did disperse the farther north we went, and we were able to fly between an overcast layer above us and a scattered and dispersing layer below us. While flying at our assigned altitude (I think it was 6,500 feet) heading north, we had a Southwest Airlines 737 fly directly over us as they headed into Phoenix (approach had warned the other pilot and me, and we had each other in sight, and the controller had us separated vertically). After traffic was behind us and no factor, the controller gave us a higher altitude after cautioning of wake turbulence from the three-seven. At this point we were good to go and continued on toward Prescott. The ride was cool and smooth for a summer flight in Arizona and we were cruising at about 8500 feet.

As we approached Prescott, we heard on the center frequency that we were being followed on that another airplane was cancelling their VFR approach into Prescott because of weather. We were about 15 minutes out, so that worried me a little…but from my vantage-point, it looked like I could easily duck under a layer that was hanging around the area, and get into Prescott. We continued on, and cancelled flight following as we turned westbound at Prescott Valley so we could get ATIS and start talking to PRC tower. Sure enough, visibility under the 8000 foot layer that we ducked under was pretty good, and rain showers washed the plane a bit as we approached the airport. The wind was kicking up pretty good, over 20 kts, but almost directly aligned with a smaller cross runway (runway 12) that they have at Prescott, and that’s where I was headed, so the wind would not be a big factor. There was a bit of gusting, but I would just come in with a little extra speed to compensate. Even this smaller runway 12 was still 4400 feet long, so I wasn’t worried about that.

Besides asking for the tower to call my base for traffic I knew was on final, but couldn’t see, the approach and landing was pretty uneventful. With the wind coming at me, normally it would have seemed like a slow approach, but KPRC is over 5000 feet in elevation, and with the heat of the summer, density altitude is routinely over 8000 feet, the approach seemed pretty normal (the thin air compensated for the headwind, making it seem sort of normal). The same thing happened a couple of hours later on our departure; the headwind combined with the high density altitude cancelled each other out, and it felt like a normal takeoff in the valley. Interesting.

After landing and parking near Legend Aviation where the event was taking place. We were a bit late to meet up with Phoenix Pilot Group members, but we ate a nice lunch at the restaurant there, and then got to browse around some nice, new airplanes from Cessna, Mooney, Beech, Piper Diamond, and Cirrus. Man, those are all nice airplanes. Then, it was time to go.

The weather had actually improved a bit in the valley, but was still pretty low in Prescott. It was easy to get out, though, and on the way back my passenger snapped a few photos, which I’m including here. When we arrived back at Stellar, the air was hot (and humid by Arizona standards), but we had enjoyed the nice cool air in Prescott for a few hours, had a nice meal, and had seen some beautiful airplanes. A good morning of flying for sure.

Prescott Valley, a town close to Prescott	Approaching KPHX from the north
A close-up of the KPHX Tower	Sky Harbor (KPHX) looking down the runways

Quick Flip 6 – California Trip #1

Bill Williams — Sun, 12 Jul 2009 10:01:20 -0700

Today’s daily flip is some clips from our first day in California this summer. We started by renting a quaint little house in Hollywood and spending our days at Universal Studios. This is our first afternoon there after travelling. The intro, done by my kids, was in our rented house. After a couple of days here, we’re off to La Jolla to our favorite family vacation spot.

Scary, But In a Good Way-Project Natal

Bill Williams — Wed, 03 Jun 2009 20:33:00 -0700

Okay, I’m blown away. When I first heard about Project Natal from Microsoft, I thought, “C’mon, how good can this be?” Then I kept getting more info about it, and I saw the concept video (below). Then I though, “C’mon, how real can that be?” Then I started getting reports from press members out of E3 where it was announced about how real this really was. Then my thoughts turned to, “When can I get it? Can I beta test?”

If you haven’t heard, Project Natal is a development project in Microsoft’s gaming division (with research support, I’m sure, from Microsoft Research) that looks like it should be something coming out of academia and 10 years or more from the marketplace. It’s the interface that machines have always needed, or rather, that we have always needed to interact with them, but have dismissed as impossible, or too far out there, or too sci-fi, or just too scary. I’m talking about the next big leap in user experience (the term used to describe the experience that humans have interacting with machines). Not just with gaming, either.

Think about Tom Cruise’s interaction with the machines in the movie Minority Report…then take it further. It’s here, and it’s real. We just can’t quite get it yet.

Project Natal was introduced to the world at E3 which is just finishing up. It is not ready for market yet, and there is no release date announced, but it is unlikely to be in 2009. 2010 is a possibility, though…and I’m telling you, the waiting is going to be hard. After the reports from the press who got to actually use the system, it seems to be working quite well already.

What is it?: Project Natal a gaming and social interface that doesn’t have a physical controller. You become the controller. Using a system of a couple of cameras+microphone array and some software/hardware magic, it can recognize individuals and even small movements from fists, arms, legs, faces, etc. It recognizes depth, and voice input, and gestures that allow you to interact with the system with no wires, no controllers, no buttons…just you. You can control media, social interactions with other gamers and friends, gaming input itself, and the possibilities go on and on. I know…I’m a skeptic by nature, and this sounds too good to be true…but I’m hoping, and first reports are very, very promising.

Here are some of the reports:

“Believe the Hype”—Stuff.tv

“Microsoft's Project Natal for the Xbox 360 has changed gaming for ever.”—T3

“The hands-on demos worked great”—Wired Magazine

Here is the official video to demonstrate the vision of the product that apparently really works today.

Xbox 360 - Project Natal

Here is another video from a Microsoft Game Studios subsidiary, Lionhead Studios, who have created a concept that will really get your mind racing.

This is not just for gaming, folks, but it’s probably appropriate that that is where it’s starting. Think. Within 18 months, I believe we’ll be tasting the future of machine interaction. Scary? A little. Amazing? Unquestionably. “Open the pod bay doors, HAL”, Natal is coming.

Flying Over Hana

Bill Williams — Tue, 26 May 2009 11:53:00 -0700

For today’s video, I’m just referencing an episode that I released yesterday for my podcast, The Student Pilot Cast. This is a flight that Crystal and I took (separately, since it only has two seats) in Hana, Hawaii on Maui back in the summer of 2007. It was one of the best vacations that we have ever taken, and this, at least for me, was one of the highlights of that trip.

I hope you enjoy SPC Video #4, Flying Over Hana. Let me know what you think.

I’m including the video here, but for the original post on the podcast site, you can go here.

SPC Video #004-Flying Over Hana from Bill Williams on Vimeo.

Daily Flip 5 – SGTRI

Bill Williams — Thu, 14 May 2009 11:48:00 -0700

Well, I did another triathlon last weekend, the SGTRI. Actually, while a different race, it was the same venue from my first full tri which got cancelled due to weather after the swim. This time wind and waves got the swim start delayed, and then cancelled as well. I’m not having good luck at this venue. So, the race organizers turned it into a run-bike-run event. It turns out this was a really hard course, both the bike an the run. They were much harder than I had expected. I bombed on the last run, but finished, so I guess that’s something.

I did the tri with my friend, Matt, and my brother, Cory. Matt lives here in Mesa and Cory lives in Park City, UT. Matt and I had planned on having me fly us up to St. George, UT, where the event was. That would turn an 8 or so hour drive into a 2 hour flight. Then my brother asked if I could come pick him up near Park City…so of course, I agreed. After dropping Matt and our gear off at St. George Airport (KSGU), I got back in the plane and flew up to Provo, UT (KPVU) and picked up my brother. Then we both flew back to Hurricane, UT (1L8) where our rental home was as well as the actual triathlon (Hurricane is about a 20 minute drive from St. George). Matt and I got to fly over the western edge of the Grand Canyon both ways. Here are a couple of pics from that.

We stayed in a great house that was only a couple of miles from the start of the race, so we were able to ride our bikes in on the morning of the tri…no parking or waiting in long car lines necessary. It was great! My friend, Jen, from high school and her husband, Marcello, drove up from their home in Las Vegas to cheer us on and take some great photos.

We had a great time. I wasn’t happy with my performance, but that just gives me some additional motivations in my training…I’ll improve for next time. Even so, I got to hang out with a lot of great people, got to race in a triathlon, and got to do a lot of flying! A great weekend, indeed, despite Sandy Hill.

I dedicated a daily flip video to the experience. It’s a little long for a daily flip, but I hope you enjoy it.

Daily Flip 4-Training

Bill Williams — Sun, 03 May 2009 12:08:29 -0700

Matt and I are competing in the St. George Triathlon this Saturday, May 9th, so today’s daily flip was a nice easy training ride we took yesterday. I’m not as prepared for this tri as I was for my last one (physically), but I think mentally I’m even more prepared. No matter, it should be fun.

I’m flying Matt and I up to the event on Friday and flying home on Sunday in the Skylane. We were lucky enough to be able to rent a home very close to the Tri venue and not too far from the small GA airport that we will be flying into in Hurricane, UT. Should be pretty convenient.

Enjoy today’s daily flip of Matt and I goofing around on the bikes, enjoying the outdoors, and generally having a fun ride with very little pain. That’s a first for a while. Some of it is jumpy when I was doing a point of view charging down a hill in the wind…but that’s what it feels like on the bike sometimes…so I left it in.

Daily Flip 3-Not a Belly-Itcher

Bill Williams — Sat, 02 May 2009 00:03:50 -0700

Today’s daily flip comes from the weekend warrior files. For the second weekend in a row, my wonderful wife, Crystal, has organized a softball game for a big group of our friends. Today, for some reason, both Crystal, and later myself, both had our quads start to seize up on us. Is it a sign of age? Crystal and I are both fairly active. She plays racquetball and works out at the gym all the time. I’ve been training for a triathlon. Still, though, lately playing softball and spending an hour at the batting cages recently seems to be taking a toll on us. As it turns out, we’re not alone. Many of our compadres were feeling a little stiff tonight during and after the game. Maybe we are just getting old…who knows? One thing I do know, though, is that once your at the field, pain or not, there’s no NOT playing…so there we all were, having a blast.

We got some Gyro’s from George’s before the game, and Todd and Rachel broke out donuts afterwards for Todd’s birthday. Also, a lot of fun softball under the lights in between. I hope you enjoy today’s flip video.

Daily Flip 002

Bill Williams — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 19:26:15 -0700

Hey everyone. Installment number two of the Billwil Daily Flip. Today we get a couple of at-bats from my youngest son’s baseball game tonight. I hope you enjoy.

In other Flip news, the Flip UltraHD was released today (thanks, Tim, for tweeting about it). Might need to upgrade at some point.

The Daily Flip 001

Bill Williams — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 22:43:20 -0700

Inspired by a comment from one of my Facebook friends, Jennifer, I’ve decided to start Billwil’s Daily Flip, so called because of the little camera I use to capture it (Flip Ultra). I’m sure it won’t really be daily, but the Daily Flip has a nice ring to it. We’ll see how it goes; I won’t worry about quality or production value…I’ll just use Flips rudimentary tools to get them out quickly.

Tonight's Daily Flip is about my oldest son. He has a project to do tonight at school, almost a performance art meets history project. Each student had to impersonate a wax sculpture of an assigned historical figure, and then recite a memorized spiel on that person when their “button” was pushed. Interesting. Meanwhile, Crystal, my slightly agoraphobic wife, was about to go crazy because of the packed hallways at the school. You, on the other hand, get to enjoy it from the comfort of wherever you are.

Simma-Down Now!

Bill Williams — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:38:00 -0700

Okay, I want to start this post with a statement of fact; I am not a doctor or a disease control specialist, nor do I have training in anything related to disease control. I do, however, have common sense, and 30 some odd years experience with being a consumer of the media. Based on all of this experience and common sense, I have one thing to say, “Can everyone just please calm down?”

This swine flu thing has just gotten ridiculous. The media loves it because everyone is scared an following everything they can on this. The CDC loves it because they have a voice right now, and probably believe that they can actually lower the death toll this year from the flu (that’s the generic ‘flu’, meaning every strain), and politicians love it because they can get some additional dollars to spend (Obama is already asking for $1.5B, with a ‘B’, to fight swine flu). The only people who don’t love it are those of us who have actually thought this through.

Let me ask and answer some questions to allow the reader to gain some perspective. Does anyone know how many people each year die in the US from various influenza viruses (flu)? Well I’ll tell ya! (homage to Steve Martin, some of you will get the reference). On average, during the 90’s, 36,000 people died each year from flu-related causes, according to the CDC. Does anyone know how many have died in the U.S. so far from this strain of the flu, commonly called the swine or pig flu? Zero. That’s right, no deaths yet attributed to this flu in the U.S. Even if some do happen, it will be a small percentage, I’m sure, of the overall flu deaths this year. Do you realize, at least at this point, that you are more likely to be killed by an actual pig than by this virus? Chew on that one for a while.

It reminds me a bit of the hysteria that always surrounds shark attacks. It is staggeringly unlikely to die by shark, or even get injured by one, even if you spend a fair amount of time in the ocean. Shark attacks, though, and feeding on people’s irrational fear of sharks, makes for a good news story. I see similar frenzies related to airplane accidents. While airplanes are generally a very safe way to travel or have fun, people, for whatever reason, tend to be scared of them. News agencies and politicians use these types of fears all of the time to create panic for their gain. Now, before someone freaks out, I don’t put most of the blame on those exploiting fear, but mostly on those being exploited. All it takes is a little critical thought and a little self education to realize you don’t have to be susceptible to exploit in this way. It does beg the question though; which came first, the irrational fears that people have or the hysteria created by the media? Interesting anthropological question…does the hysteria creation and fear mongering just feed on these fears, or partially cause them, too?

Back to the virus. I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be told about this strain or variation of the virus, or that people shouldn’t try to keep from spreading the flu (again, generic flu, as in any strain); this is common sense. But personally I believe this hysteria is way overblown and everyone needs to just take a deep breath and get on with your life. Nothing to see here, folks. Disagree? Convince me. Leave comments on what you think.

Windows 7 Had a Secret

Bill Williams — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 00:22:33 -0700

Indulge me for a bit of background. Less than a week ago a colleague and I were talking about the possibilities of a virtualization system that would allow future versions of Windows to forgo all of the baggage of compatibility with, well, everything that has ever been written for Windows. One of the necessary evils of being the vendor of the world’s most widely used client operating system is that each new release needs some form of compatibility with software meant for previous versions. This is especially true with business applications that must run on the new OS before an organization can roll out the new platform. This was a major problem for Windows Vista when it was first released over two years ago; many applications weren’t compatible yet. This has largely been fixed by the vendors of those applications, but it was a formidable barrier to adoption of Windows Vista. Even if an organization or an individual wanted the benefits of Windows Vista, if an essential application that they needed was not compatible, those benefits had to generally be forgone, at least without some technical gymnastics that involved dual booting, running some additional OS virtually and managing two PCs in a virtual way, etc., solutions that are not for regular people.

Enter Windows XP mode for Windows 7, announced recently by the Supersite for Windows and validated by the folks on the Windows 7 team blog. For details on the technology see these entries; I’ll be talking about the ramifications here, not the minutia of the feature which is being covered by others. Okay, a little more background is necessary. Microsoft, for some time, has had a set of products available for larger organizations to manage their desktops in an efficient way. These tools are generally geared for organizations with large numbers of desktop PCs running Windows XP or Windows Vista to help reduce the cost of said management. The tools are part of a package known as Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP) and includes 6 distinct products. One of these products is called Microsoft Enterprise Desktop Virtualization (MEDV) which was added to the group within the past 6 months. This product addresses the OS/Application compatibility issue outlined above by allowing an organization to deploy a virtual machine running a different (usually a previous) version of the OS, and allow some applications to run in this virtual environment, while optionally hiding most of the virtual environment from the end user. Essentially, this let’s a user run an application that is not compatible with Vista on Vista. This is very important functionality for organizations to allow them to deploy a new OS even when not ALL of their applications run on it yet.

But, what about a typical small business user or an advanced home user? The Windows 7 team has just announced that functionality very similar to MEDV is being released as a free download for future users of Windows 7 Professional, Enterprise, and Ultimate editions. This feature, called Windows XP Mode, essentially allows a user to be able to install and use virtually any software that works in XP in Windows 7. The ramifications of this technology, and future versions of technology like this, are huge. Let me explain.

Windows, over time, has had to continue to grow as features were added, libraries and APIs were changed and added, etc. Because of the vast user base for Windows and the importance of backward compatibility, some technical tricks have been done over the years to try to keep new versions of the OS compatible as much as possible with old versions of software. Microsoft has been fairly successful doing this for quite some time, but this has come at a cost. Some of these costs are listed here.

Change has been slowed. Even good changes have sometimes been cancelled or slowed because of the ramifications of compatibility.
Continually growing compatibility layers (software in the OS that can trick applications into running in an OS that they are not compatible with have been added to each new version of Windows).
Advancements in Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) have to bring along historical baggage of the old APIs (deprecated) to ensure compatibility with older software.
Increasingly complex code base has to be maintained because of all of the above.

There are others…but you get the idea. Using virtualization is a big win for the OS because a cleaner break can be made between each release, if necessary, while still allowing the much needed compatibility. Because this can be achieved through virtualization, these other tricks can be at least partially abandoned which will result in new versions of Windows being cleaner, smaller, lighter, and more secure. This isn’t a panacea, though, as there are downsides to this type of compatibility as well.

Additional resources, especially memory, are needed to make this type of virtualization feasible; you won’t generally be able to do this well on, for example, a low-end netbook.
Even though much of the additional virtual OS is hidden from the user, it doesn’t mean it is not there. This leads to some questions of how that additional OS will be patched, if necessary, and weather or not it increases the attack surface of the computer.
There is a question as to whether this type of technology will confuse end users.

Almost all of the downsides of this type of compatibility can be addressed by good implementation. The only one that can’t is the issue of additional resources needed to run the virtual OS. I believe that in most cases, this will be a non-issue going forward. We have already reached a point where increasing the power of the processor in a computer and increasing the amount of RAM available will have diminishing returns for MOST users. As the prices of hardware continue to decrease, we may have found a very good use for that extra power that almost all new PC’s have; virtualization. In addition, this extra horsepower is only needed when one of the “incompatible” applications is running. With most applications it won’t even be an issue.

So that leaves all of the possible drawbacks that actually can be minimized by a good implementation. A direct hit by Microsoft for this technology will be something that is easy (and automatic) for an end user to keep patched, and when installing Windows XP mode, or any applications that need it, a seamless and expected experience. We already know what the experience is like when running an application virtually like this, and it is quite good (i.e. the experience is essentially the same as running any other application). I am very interested in getting a chance to test this functionality from the perspective of an end user, and you can bet I will update this blog with my results. I’m very encouraged by what I see at this point, though.

So to bring this back around, I asked, and I received. This functionality has come earlier than I had expected, which doesn’t happen very often. Since I have only heard of the feature recently, I thought we would not see it until perhaps Windows 8, so I’m sure you’ll understand how pleasantly surprised I was to find out we would be beta testing this very soon. Here is a screenshot from the Windows Blog of an application running in this mode, and its icon in the start menu.

Make no mistake, this is big news for Windows 7, and the Windows platform in general. If the team working on this implements this well, it can, and will, change a lot of things going forward. Time will tell, but so far this looks like a big win for Windows users.

A Ph.D. in Horribleness

Bill Williams — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 16:37:07 -0700

If anyone hasn’t checked out Joss Whedon’s “Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog” yet, go ahead and enjoy it right here. Joss (the creator of several comedy/sci fi TV Shows, including Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and the current, less comedic, more dramatic, The Dollhouse) and his brothers have created this three act webisode feature that is absolutely incredible. In fact, it might be the most creative thing I’ve seen “on TV” in quite a while. All three acts total about 42 minutes, so about the time it takes to watch a TV Drama without the commercials (does anyone watch commercials anymore?).

In any case, it is worth a watch. Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met Your Mother, and, well, you remember Doogie Howser don’t you?) and Patricia Day (of another popular webisode series, The Guild) are incredible. Nathan Fillion (as Captain Hammer) makes a great villainous-hero (roles are reversed in this one). The writing is great, the humor is subtle at times, and performances and timing are fantastic. I’ve seen it five times now, and every single time I discover something new. Not sure that trend will continue beyond 5 views, but nevertheless, there is a lot of comedy hidden in this gem. A sequel is in the works…but the medium and timing are unknown at this time. For more information, check out the official fan site. Enjoy, and leave comments on what you think. Don’t miss the full screen button in the upper right corner of the video…sit back and relax while you watch.

Windows 7 Snacks

Bill Williams — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 13:14:00 -0700

Microsoft Learning has developed some cool learning “snacks” about about various Windows 7 topics to help you start to get familiar with enhancements and changes in Windows 7. These snacks are simply short demos/training clips for the various subjects.

Here are some of the more generally interesting ones:

Desktop Experience in Windows 7

Setting up a Home Network in Windows 7

Implementing User Account Control

Introduction to Windows 7

And for business/enterprise users, here’s some good stuff:

Bitlocker and AppLocker in Windows 7

Using DISM tool for Servicing Windows 7 Images

And, for a general directory of all of the Learning Snacks on various products, go to the Learning Snacks index page.

I’m now waiting (somewhat impatiently) for the Release Candidate of Windows 7.

Friend not Fish Video Update

Bill Williams — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 11:40:27 -0700

To all those who are waiting for the official Friend not Fish 2008 Video to be released, I have hit a milestone. An essential piece of my editing studio was broken for a couple of months…it has now been repaired by Sony, and is back in my hands. My first order of business was to capture all of the footage into my editing suite so I can continue to get this done. I’m making it my highest priority now…well, after all the other higher priority items. :) It’s my highest priority video project, now, though.

Stay tuned…I’ll keep posting updates as I progress. It should be a good one this year. Thanks for your patience. In the meantime, here is a little pic from Hawaii this past January…a couple of whale tails to tide you over for the FNF08 video.

Windows 7 Beta Publicly Released

Bill Williams — Wed, 07 Jan 2009 23:32:22 -0700

In SteveB’s CES kickoff keynote Wednesday night, he announced the public availability of the Windows 7 Beta release. Windows 7 is the next release of the desktop operating system from Microsoft, to succeed Windows Vista. This is good news for tweakers and tech-heads, and anyone who wants to stay ahead of the curve. The announcement indicated that this Friday it will be publicly available and starting tonight, is already available to TechNet and MSDN subscribers.

I’ve gotta say, I’ve been running Windows 7 (first the tech preview, and now the Beta…build 1400 for the last few days) on one of my laptops, and I am loving it. In fact, I’m typing this post from Windows Live Writer on Windows 7 right now. I’m not a Vista hater (I’ve had really good luck with Vista…and love a lot of the features…and actually find it very difficult to use XP now), but I really like a lot about Windows 7 so far. Here’s a few highlights (not nearly a comprehensive overview though).

The New Taskbar

Besides the quicker boot-up, the first thing most people will notice is the new taskbar. Mine as it sits right now is shown above. Here is a close up of the running and “pinned” apps that I have right now.

Obviously, this taskbar looks different…but it acts quite a bit different, too. First of all, it combines some of the functionality of the old quick launch toolbar and the taskbar. In other words, you can pin apps to the taskbar so they show up whether they are running or not…and you can launch them (or switch to them if not already running) with a single click. There is a subtle, but easily recognizable difference between running apps and non-running apps. Notice above the Zune icon…it appears “flush” with the background. This indicates that it is not currently running. The Skype icon, on the other hand, shows that it is running (it has a subtle raised effect in the glass). In fact, if you look to the left where the Internet Explorer icon is, you will notice that I multiple instances and tabs (conveniently combined in the UI) open, so there are multiple glass layers there. Finally, since I’m typing in Live Writer now, you’ll notice that it’s icon “glass” is somewhat smoked, or opaque, indicating that it holds the current focus. Simple and subtle, but useful and easily noticed without thinking much about it. This behavior can be customized as well. I’ve heard some in the media complain that the new taskbar is too different, and too subtle, and at first I agreed (and even changed the defaults), but the more I use it, the more I like it. Besides….it’s pretty.

I won’t get into the jump lists (finding them useful when I remember to use them…getting better at it), changing desktop backgrounds, etc…but it’s safe to say there are some really useful gems, most of which I probably haven’t discovered yet. And again…it’s pretty.

System Tray

The system tray in the lower right corner (typically) is a little different as well. Now Windows gives the user full control over what shows up there and what doesn’t from a single and easy to use configurator. This is a welcome change. For each tray icon, you can choose to display the icon and notifications, notifications only (the toaster and the icon temporarily show up when a notification happens from that tray icon), or hide completely (out of sight, out of mind).

Libraries

Windows 7 has a new concept of libraries; essentially libraries of different types of documents. These libraries can point to multiple physical locations on various disks (even removable disks and network shares), but ccollect and show a collation of these documents and files together as a single library. This is great for most users, and I’m already finding myself liking it for it’s simplicity and ease when it comes time to find a picture or save a video. Windows 7 ships with four libraries by default (Documents, Pictures, Music, Videos), but users can add as many as they want, and even modify the built-in ones.

HomeGroups and Device Management

Both home networking and managing devices is easier on Windows 7. The Homegroup concept, while I haven’t tested extensively, looks really promising. It allows even domain joined computers (like a work laptop for example) to automatically and easily participate in a group of home computers, and use devices (like printers and media centers) while it’s there. Unfortunately, I’m not sure I’ll get to use this much because in my limited experience, it appears that you cannot create HomeGroups from domain-joined computers (although, as I said, they can participate in one). Since I run a domain at home, and of course use one at work, this may not be something I personally can take advantage of…although I’m in an extreme minority of home users who run a domain.

As for the device management, you may have heard of Device Stage. I’m not sure if that’s the official name, but managing devices in Windows 7, whatever the tool is called, is looking much easier and very promising. It is a very graphical view of all of your devices and resources along with the ability to change their settings, update drivers, etc., all from one place.

Compatibility, Speed, and Drivers

I saved the best for last. Windows 7 is fast. It boots faster than XP and Vista. It resumes faster the XP and Vista. It runs better with 1 or 2 GB of memory. 64-bit (which I’m running on two machines) is solid with no driver issues. I’m throwing all sorts of weird devices and drivers at it, as well as software, and so far, no glitches. I had to install the beta version of Skype, which seems to run great, but other than that everything just works. Every software package I’ve installed from the standard Office 2007 tools to very specialized stuff like Voyager 4 flight planning software and Flip Video’s FlipShare is working great. I’ve installed Visual Studio 2008 (which is monster big with lots of dependencies) with no problems as well.

I’ve thrown some non-standard hardware at it, too. Again, the Flip Video (with or without it’s drivers from the manufacturer) just worked…and shows up quickly and easily on the device stage. More surprisingly, perhaps, is the results from just slapping on my M-Audio Mobile PRE USB interface (which allows my to connect high end microphones and power them using phantom power, adjust built in pre-amps using physical knobs, and monitor using headphones, etc.). I plugged it in, and it just worked…both outputting audio as well as the inputs from the analog mics. Remember…this is 64-bit, too. M-Audio is working on 64-bit Vista drivers for this unit (which will work in Windows 7, I’m sure), but even without those drivers, everything works great just by plugging it in. I’m not sure how, but I’m happy. I’m really trying to break it, but I can’t

I did have a driver issue with the wireless on one of my laptops. I was getting crashes while using wireless. After thinking, “Well, after all, it is beta.” and dismissing it, I noticed that Windows Update was notifying me of an optional update to the wireless chip driver in my laptop. I accepted it, and it fixed the issue. I’m amazed. This really doesn’t seem like a beta product to me…at least not yet. Maybe I will start to discover more issues…but as it stands, I’m very close to upgrading almost all of my production machines to Windows 7 beta (at least as a dual boot for testing).

How to Get it

Brandon LeBlanc on the Windows 7 Team Blog has a nice write-up about downloading the beta. More information on how to get it can be found there and on the Windows 7 website, especially as the public release day (this Friday) approaches.

Oh ya…one last thing. I got a big chuckle out of the default desktop background (the focal point of which I’ve featured here). See if you get the joke. Enjoy Windows 7.

Podcast Regularity Diversion

Bill Williams — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 10:20:57 -0700

A quick Photoshop session today after talking with David Allen produced this. See my post on my Student Pilot Cast website for the background. I’m still chuckling a little.

Strange Bedfellows

Bill Williams — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 10:21:25 -0700

I was updating one of my Vista machine’s installed JRE a couple of days ago, and I noticed something interesting. I’m sure this has been old news for a while, but it was the first time I had noticed it. While running the installer from Sun Microsystems, I got what seems these days like the obligatory “toolbar” up-sell. This time though, even though this is software from Sun, the up-sell was for the MSN/Live toolbar. I thought this was an interesting combo, and took a quick screenshot of the installer (below). Of course the next screen was an ad for Sun’s Open Office as a “good enough” alternative to Microsoft Office, so maybe the dogs and cats aren’t quite living together yet, but close.

Favorite Unboxing Video

Bill Williams — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 23:20:40 -0700

I found this a couple of months ago…and of course it still reigns as my favorite tech unboxing video yet. Enjoy.

A Little Effort this Year

Bill Williams — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 23:05:19 -0700

Okay…so I usually don’t go all out for seasonal decorations…it’s just not my thing, but for some unknown reason, I decided to put a little effort into our pumpkin carving this year for Halloween. I did a little research on the interwebs, and decided to “help” my kids do their pumpkins. After seeing some success, I asked my wife to pick up a pumpkin for me, which she kindly did, and I proceeded to undertake the most difficult carving job of my young carving career; the mug of Sarah Palin. I figured with the election being a short three days away or so, it was apropos. I had been taught via the web that you can actually accomplish “shading” with pumkin carvings, which I didn’t realize was possible before three days ago.

Well, it created quite the stir in the neighborhood. Word spread of the unlikely masterpiece, and people started coming as if to the neighborhood pumpkin Mecca. Lot’s of comments and ooh’s and ah’s. Honestly, while I was working on it for the two hours that I spent, I really didn’t think it would turn out (and neither did my wife, Crystal). Even when it was mostly done I thought it was a bust…but I put a little light in it and turned down the lights, and voilà! I did some finishing touches to bring out the glasses a little more, and added shading to the hair, and I was done. We put them out for all to enjoy who could make it by…and now I’m putting them out for you.

First, the kid’s pumpkins.

And, for the Palin.

All in good fun, I guess.

Enterprise Library 4.1 Released

Bill Williams — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 12:37:31 -0700

I know, sounds boring to most people, but for enterprise developers, this is cool stuff. In case you care, and didn't know, the latest release of Enterprise Library has been released.

Microsoft patterns & practices is excited to announce the latest addition to
the p&p library of software architecture guidance:

Enterprise Library 4.1

October 2008 Release

– MSDN site: http://msdn.microsoft.com/entlib

– Community Forum: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=119312

– Community Extensions: http://codeplex.com/entlibcontrib

Enterprise Library is a collection of reusable software components (application blocks) designed to assist software developers with common enterprise development challenges (such as logging, validation, caching, exception handling, and many others). Application blocks are a type of guidance encapsulating Microsoft recommended development practices; they are provided as source code, tests plus documentation that can be used "as is," extended, or modified by developers to use on complex, enterprise-level line-of-business development projects.

I haven't had a chance to try it out yet, but wanted to pass it along.

The Blue Angels, Brian Terwilliger style

Bill Williams — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 11:16:00 -0700

Wow. Brian Terwilliger, the director and producer of the great aviation documentary film One Six Right, has done it again. This time in a very high quality web vignette about his history and his media ride with the Navy jet demonstration team, the Blue Angels. I can’t say any more that you won’t get from seeing, so just watch “Flying Full Circle”.

Feel free to watch it here if you’re pressed for time, but if not, do yourself a favor and watch (or download) a higher quality version at Brian’s site. Enjoy.

Hold on for a Second-Gotta Grab a PSP Before my Flight

Bill Williams — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 12:16:00 -0700

I know these have been around for a while…but I have never seen one, until this week. I ended up in Las Vegas a few days ago on business, and ran into my first Sony Vending Machine in the airport. I could not resist snapping a quick picture of it. While music videos looped on the LCD display, a myriad Sony electronic gadgets and accessories attempt to lure you into parting with your money. Look, I’m all for not having to talk to lame, pimple-faced teenager, uninformed store salesmen that you find in most electronic stores, but this takes half the fun out of shopping, or more accurately, returning, electronics. Who are you supposed to yell at? Additionally, this was in the Las Vegas airport, inside the terminal (i.e. the business side of the ever-so-vigilant TSA). Even if you could drum up the gumption from deep inside yourself to come back and yell at the machine, you’d have to buy some sort of airplane ticket for the privilege. I suppose there’s a phone number you can call if you have problems, but that’s not face to face yelling, so it’s not the same.

On the other hand, if you’ve just paid $5.00 to United/US Air/Delta/[Insert your dysfunctional airline here] for a $0.20 replica of a pair of headphones on your flight (along with $3.00 for a water and $7.00 for some crackers and cheese), you may be inclined to buy a pair of Sony Noise Cancelling Headphones from the vending machine (which they prefer to call a robotic storefront, but let’s be real) for $200. This is worth it because you get a return of $100 over your next 20 flights by not having to buy the crappy earphones that they are selling every time, and the other $100 of value comes from not having to listen to any of the announcements from the cockpit or the flight attendants asking you if you want to buy a $3.00 water. After all, these cancel noise, and that’s what you want. Another thing…what do you think the chances are that they pre-charge the electronic devices that need batteries. How disappointing to buy your new PSP for the 3 hour plane ride but you have no juice. This just helps prove my theory above…it’s for the disembarking airline spit-outs, not those all fresh for their travel. They expect your defenses are down AFTER the flight.

So, the next time you step off that plane all hot and bothered about just getting mugged by the airline, pull out the credit card (if you have any money left), and keep your eyes out for one of these Sony vending machines, and purchase your headphones/PSP/MP3 player/etc. Trust me, you’ll feel better. Or not.

Getting excited for ASU Football

Bill Williams — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 21:47:00 -0700

It’s August, and that means we’re in the month of the first ASU game of the 2008-2009 college football season. In Arizona, it doesn’t really feel like football yet because it’s still so hot…but I know it’s coming, and I’m starting to get excited. The group of people that I have season tickets with has grown once again…so I think we have a group of 12 or so, now…so it keeps getting better and better.

This is a huge season for ASU, too. It’s the sophomore season for (not so new anymore) head coach Dennis Erickson, and after a phenomenal debut season last year for him, expectations are high. Add to that a couple of returning players who were injured last year as well as a maturing team that didn’t loose too much talent, and we have a recipe for a great season.

While every game is important, and because the PAC 10 is so competitive and is structured in such a way that everyone plays everyone (unlike, say, the SEC or the Big 12) it’s even more so, there are a couple of games that stand out. First, of course, is USC. Once again, USC is expected to win the PAC 10…but hopefully Dennis and friends will have something to say about that. But if we head outside of the conference, there’s an equally big game with top ranked Georgia. I’m already having flashbacks to Nebraska and 19-0, but I’ll try not to get ahead of myself.

In any case, we’re in for an exciting year, and I personally can’t wait for it to get started at the end of this month. Here is the Sun Devil 2008 schedule.

Date	Opponent	Home/Away	Time
8/30/08	Northern Arizona	Home	7:00 PM
9/6/08	Stanford	Home	7:00 PM
9/13/08	UNLV	Home	7:00 PM
9/20/08	Georgia	Home	5:13 PM
10/4/08	California	Away	TBA
10/11/08	USC	Away	TBA
10/25/08	Oregon	Home	TBA
11/1/08	Oregon State	Away	7:15 PM
11/8/08	Washington	Away	TBA
11/15/08	Washington State	Home	TBA
11/28/08	UCLA	Home	7:30
12/6/08	UA	Away	TBA

GO DEVILS!

Podapalooza 2008 Posted on Student Pilot Cast

Bill Williams — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 00:01:00 -0700

I’ve just released part 1 of the 2008 edition of Podapalooza on my aviation podcast, which was recorded in Oshkosh at EAA Airventure. Podapalooza is the gathering of aviation podcasters in Oshkosh each year. As well as being released on the feed for my Student Pilot Cast and several other aviation podcast feeds, this year it was broadcast live on EAA Radio as well as on the Internet. Part 2 is following soon.

Participating in this year's event was, in the order they were sitting, Uncontrolled Airspace, The Student Pilot Cast, The Finer Points, Airspeed, and the Pilotcast (along with CFI cast). Remoted in via skype was Will and Dave of the Pilot's Flight Pod Log. Notably missing this year were new pilot, Greg, from the Student Pilot Journal and student pilot Jerry from VA Student Pilot. I'm probably forgetting others as well, so forgive me.

I also want to note that Airventure Today (the daily Airventure newspaper) did an article on the Podapalooza, so check that out if want to.

I really enjoyed participating this year, and felt honored to be on the stage with so many talented people. It's a great community of people in aviation. I had a great time in Oshkosh in general, and was able, with the help of my friend Kent from the Pilotcast, to experience two approaches into OSH. That was incredible. The show itself is overwhelmingly large and covers everything in aviation, from the smallest of the ultralights to the largest plane I’ve ever seen (the Boeing Dreamlifter), and everything in between. I’m including a few pics from the event.

An AeroShell T6 lines up for takeoff at the daily airshow

The old tower is set to be torn down soon.

Duggy the DC-3.

And for the largest, here is the Boeing DreamLifter, which is used to carry parts of the new 787 DreamLiner halfway across the world.

Xbox 360 Gets a Facelift

Bill Williams — Tue, 15 Jul 2008 11:46:04 -0700

As E3 continues, we got some updates yesterday from Microsoft on the future of the Xbox 360. It turns out the with the Fall release, a lot of changes are coming. First, for the first time in history (according to the release), a major consumer device will get a complete makeover for free through the power of software. Essentially, every Xbox 360 that’s out in the wild right now will get a free upgrade this fall that will essentially change the experience without having to buy a new console. This is the beauty of software.

Over the last several years, Microsoft has released new versions of the console, integrating new hardware such as larger disk drives and HDMI connectivity, all the while, the underlying platform has stayed the same. This fall, Microsoft will release a free software update that is in some ways akin to releasing a new console…but nobody will have to purchase anything new. The update is not just glitz and frosting, either, as far as I can tell right now. One of the things that will change is the culmination of an exclusive partnership just announced at E3 between Xbox and Netflix, wherein if you are an Xbox Live subscriber (who isn’t…I’ll get to that in a second) and a Netflix subscriber, you will have an online queue in Netflix that you can add movies and TV shows to. Then, from a TV connected to an Xbox 360, you can choose to watch these movies, and they will begin to stream…starting in as little as 30 seconds. This isn’t a new idea…I know. Heck, even Microsoft has been enabling this scenario through Media Center for years, but this partnership and integrated experience, along with a lot of new content available through the Live Marketplace, is a giant step toward true Living Room Integration (LRI) and Home Theater Integration (HTI). Alright…I just made those terms up…but it works, right?

So…first a quick note about Xbox Live. Also announced at E3 was that Xbox Live Membership has doubled both of the last two years. Last year from 3 Million to 6 Million, and this year again to 12 Million. It's becoming sort of the de facto TV/gaming-based community…and even now encompasses PC gamers (released last year). I think with the momentum behind Live, great things are to come. Now, back to this upgrade.

Also, as part of the upgrade, the whole 360 interface will change from the innovative, but aging crisscross interface to something more carousel-like. This type of interface is something that Microsoft has been working on for years an years…I remember seeing prototypes of carousel interfaces aimed at Windows (way before Vista) over 5 or 6 years ago. It looks like an incarnation of that has made it to the Xbox in what looks to be a pretty effective and cool looking UI.

Microsoft is calling this the “New Xbox Experience”, and you can read about what has been announced so far here. But the highlights are:

Tons of new games, including some sequels to established or up-and coming franchises, including
- Rock Band 2
- Guitar Hero World Tour
- Gears of War 2
- Fable II
- Resident Evil 5
- A new Scene It
- etc.
A new “interactive game show” system through Xbox Live produced by the makers of “Deal or No Deal”
Live Parties
Create customized avatars (a la the Nintendo Wii, but better looking)
Tons of new media content (TV shows and Movies) through both Netflix and the Live Marketplace
Of course, the new User Interface

Here is a video showing a trailer for the update…

Video: Xbox 360 New Experience Trailer XboxFront