Using a magazine to hold your media player

A magazine can be used to make an adhoc viewing stand for your media device. When I travel, flying mostly, I often want to watch movies or video podcasts during the trip. On one flight I was frustrated by having to hold the player so I tried to find something to rest the device on.

After failed attempts with various items from my travel bag, I decided I was ok with sacrificing an American Way magazine if it meant I could watch my content and banish hand cramps from my traveling experience.

After a couple of minutes experimentation, I developed the technique described below. For those of you, like me, that are squeamish about bending pages, this technique is completely reversible causing no lasting damage to the magazine.

Materials

• Magazine (Heavy covers work better
• Media device (iPod Touch for me)

Steps

• Orient the magazine so that the back is away from you.
• Then lift the top 10-20 pages and fold the edge underneath into the back of the magazine.
• Lift 15 pages or less and fold them up and into the back of the magazine.
• Prop your device so that the back of the media player is against the first fold and the bottom is behind the second fold. Adjust the bottom fold as needed to prevent sliding

Video

Here is a short video showing the technique.

HowTo: Create an iPod Stand from a Magazine from Don Thorp on Vimeo.

I’ve used this technique for many trips. It works well, there are always magazines in the seat back, and one less thing to carry.

What I’m not trying to do with this post is bash Obama, it is just an example of the type of speech that bothers me. Take a look at the two paragraphs below. This link was brought to my attention by @repeatnone. I have included the link to the original letter, so please read it.

Yesterday during a town hall meeting, President Obama got his facts completely wrong. He stated that a surgeon gets paid $50,000 for a leg amputation when, in fact, Medicare pays a surgeon between $740 and $1,140 for a leg amputation. This payment also includes the evaluation of the patient on the day of the operation plus patient follow-up care that is provided for 90 days after the operation. Private insurers pay some variation of the Medicare reimbursement for this service.

Three weeks ago, the President suggested that a surgeon’s decision to remove a child’s tonsils is based on the desire to make a lot of money. That remark was ill-informed and dangerous, and we were dismayed by this characterization of the work surgeons do. Surgeons make decisions about recommending operations based on what’s right for the patient.
- Excerpted from http://www.facs.org/news/obama081209.html

Let’s examine the statement in the first paragraph. Anyone who has looked at an EOB (Estimate of Benefits, if you have insurance) knows that $50,000 does not go to one individual doctor and the amount that insurance reimburses the doctor is typically nowhere near the initial invoice amount. A portion goes to the hospital, the anesthesiologist, re-sterilizing instruments and the operating room, etc. It’s an over generalization that might lead someone not inclined to question blanket statements to take it as fact and spread the wrong message.

I have not read or seen the entire town hall transcript so I am definitely NOT trying to say it was deliberate. It could have been over simplified by an aide or later explained in full. I’m just trying to point out the danger in that type of statement. Although it’s for a smaller amount of money, the doctor asking to be paid amount X but agreeing to accept amount Y is no different than a grocery store asking you to pay X for canned goods, but will accept Y if you have a coupon. That part of the statement refers to a simple business transaction that many of use are very familiar with. It seems worse because the quoted invoice amount in absolute terms is so much more than a can of beans that it immediately invokes anger at the greed of the “doctor” to bill that amount.

Which brings us to paragraph two. Assigning intent to a group of people which implies that all members of that group have that exact motivation and can have no other motivation for the given statement. There are many ways this type of statement can be expressed. We all know that very few things in life have only two possible outcomes commonly described as black and white. Most everything in we actually deal with in life is probabilistic or shades of gray. Sometimes we only have horrible choices where we try and select the least horrible choice when we have to make a choice on the issue.

One of my favorite examples is when someone says “You always” or “You never”. Firstly, how many times is that ever true of anyone or any situation. Even trained dogs don’t always do the same thing. This statement usually appears during an argument when you want to inflict emotional damage to make a point. It’s hardly ever constructive.

To make a blanket statement that ascribes greed as the only motivation for a doctor to remove a child’s tonsils is no better than saying every American is just like George Bush, Bill Clinton, or insert any other person in the country here. We all know there are extremes where some members of a population may have that characteristic and we will probably admit, if we’re not being lazy, that there are many other people in that population that don’t exhibit that characteristic, in fact it’s probably a large portion of the population in question.

Finding a solution for healthcare in this country is a complex problem that by its very nature cannot be simplified to single one size fits all solution. I’m going to make some statements about why I believe this is true and I hope you’ll put together your own list and or help me extend or reduce mine.

1) As a nation we do not have unlimited resources to throw at this problem. We already have more programs than we can fund and we do not seem to have the collective will to cut any existing programs.

2) Doctors on average come out of school $100,000 in debt (http://www.studentdoc.com/medical-school-loans.html). I did not look up the statistics for other healthcare providers, but I’m assuming that it’s non-zero. Do we really expect healthcare professionals to not be responsible and not pay off the debt or strive to achieve the American dream?

If you want best in the world medical care the people in that profession must have the ability to compete and gain personally from their efforts. How many of you would honestly say you’d be willing to have your pay capped indefinitely regardless of your expenses, abilities, and effort you put towards the task.

3) People expect doctors to be perfect in a profession that is not always predictable. Part of the existing problems we face is due to the litigious environment we have created. If any person is truly negligent or willfully deceives others then the full weight of the legal system should be brought against them. Another part of the problem can be ascribed to the medical profession, because they do not actively remove members that have demonstrated that they are incompetent. Another issue is the number of people who sue because they didn’t get the outcome they wanted. Things go wrong in biological systems that sometimes can’t be anticipated or corrected no matter the skill of the professional.

4) Many people don’t want to change their lifestyles to reduce their total medical burden. Many of the diseases that we currently face in this country can be attributed to lifestyle. People expect to be able to be sedentary, eat whatever they want, smoke, drink in excess and then have the best medical care in the world fix them when something in their body goes wrong due to that lifestyle. I believe deeply that people have the right to live how they want, but I also strongly believe that actions can have consequences and we can’t always be absolved from them at any price.

In closing, because I’ve expanding this post enough already. This problem is not going to be fixed by political grandstanding, fear mongering, and taking sides as if it were a sporting event. I think the number of people in this country that do not want to see everyone have access to quality health care is small and maybe even non existent. And if asked do you want your friends to have access to quality care and then extend that answer to those friends, pretty soon you’ll have covered everyone in the nation.

Take a stand against speech that tries to polarize or over simplify the problem into a sound byte. Act locally so it can spread nationally. Acknowledge it for the complex problem that it is and then roll-up your sleeves and to try and help foster an environment where we can constructively build a system that we as a nation will be proud of that meets the needs of all of it’s citizens, including your elected officials.

I seem to attract storms to DFW every time I fly in or out. Most of the day yesterday (Aug 5) was clear with not a cloud in sight. A few hours before I was suppose to leave, a storm front started moving into the metroplex. There was wind sheer near the airport and apparently 70 mph straight-line winds caused some damage in Grapevine. Thankfully is scooted just North of the Airport and my flight took off with just a short delay.

My first layover ended up being 10 minutes. Thankfully the flight got us to the gate early because it ended up being at least a half mile of hallways and rescanning through a security checkpoint from my landing gate to my departing gate. I flew from LHR (London) to (HEL) Helsinki via a code sharing British Airways flight. This was my first time on BA and it was pleasant as could be expected given that it was a 757 w/ 6 seats across. The staff was very friendly and although I didn’t take advantage of it, alcoholic beverages were complimentary. If I hadn’t wanted to reset my internal clock quickly (+8 hours) from home, I most certainly would have taken them up on the offer.

Why are you in Finland

Alex has been traveling all Summer in Europe. Laura and Allison traveled with him in July, but I had too many things to get done and so I decided to travel with him in August. Another reason is that all I need is a net connection and power to work and so this is also a trip dedicated to working while living in different areas.

Tomorrow – Aug 7

So the current plan is to head down to the train station in the morning and book a sleeper from Helsinki to Rovaniemi where we will be staying at The Clarion Hotel Santa Claus for a couple of nights.

Then we’ll look around Helsinki until we need to board the train and see what the city has to offer near the train station. We will not be able to take advantage of much since we’re only here for about a day.

Since the nights are short I’m hoping to get a few photos during the train ride. We’re not sure what we’re going to do while we’re there, but it should be interesting.

Oh, and the Hair

So I had been warned by Allison and Laura that Alex’s hair was bleached blonde when they were traveling together. So naturally, as I exited the airport, I was looking for a tall kid with bleached blonde hair. At first I couldn’t figure out why this person with dark/black hair was headed up to me. Then I figured out it was Alex with blue hair so dark it looks like ink.

Update: I moved the instructions over to our documentation site where they’re easier to find..

A lot of experienced Twitter users rely on the one sided conversation feature to find people worth following. Seeing how people interact with others on twitter that I don’t already follow have resulted in some of my best online friends. Many of which I’ve met in real life.

So, Twitter, if you want to have the default setting be this new feature, then go ahead. But don’t take away one of the truly innovative features that have made the service what it is today. I’m not ready to stop discovering new interesting people, I want those one-sided replies. Otherwise, how am I suppose to expand my horizons and interact with people I’ve yet to meet.

Post from Twitter

Small Settings Update

We’ve updated the Notices section of Settings to better reflect how folks are using Twitter regarding replies. Based on usage patterns and feedback, we’ve learned most people want to see when someone they follow replies to another person they follow—it’s a good way to stay in the loop. However, receiving one-sided fragments via replies sent to folks you don’t follow in your timeline is undesirable. Today’s update removes this undesirable and confusing option.

Confused? That’s understandable and exactly why we made the update.

On the Austin to San Jose leg, a guy who looked more sleep deprived than I felt, plopped down in the seat next to me with blanket in hand. He was quiet and immediately fell asleep. A bit later, as they were serving beverages, he woke up long enough to request a 7-up. The attendant handed him a can of Sierra Mist instead. Taking the cup and can, he took just enough time to fill the cup, drink half, then slipped back into a comatose state.

The flight was mostly smooth with the occasional moment of clear air turbulence. Each time we hit a rough patch, I’d glance over at his mostly full can and half-filled cup and wonder when they were going to end up all over me.

As we neared the end of the flight, my seat mate’s slumber took a slightly more violent turn. Every so often he’d suddenly shift and spasm which, more often than not, resulted in my being kicked or elbowed. It wasn’t pleasant, but it didn’t hurt so I let it be. Anyway, by this time, I was amazed that he never woke up and that the open containers of liquid were still perched on his tray ready to cover me in sticky goo in an upcoming spasm.

Apparently, the calm air and riveting podcast novel Weather Child helped me forget about the drink. Very near the end of the flight, I was startled by the sound of his drink can hitting the tray and the cup, with some ice remaining, clattering off the side of the cabin and onto the floor.

Turning to see what had happened, I remember thinking, surely that will wake him up. Realizing that it wasn’t, I quickly reached over, righted the can, and then tried to wake him. I poked, prodded, and shook him and he slept right through it all. A little concerned I looked at his face and noticed that he was in REM sleep, dreaming away. Thinking on it now, I hoped it was at least a refreshing dream.

Not sure what else to do, I glanced over at the guy across the aisle and he shook his head, shrugged and offered no words of wisdom. Since I wasn’t his mother, I decided to just leave it alone. After having no luck trying to wake a man whose hand is sitting on the tray table in cold Sierra Mist while rivulets of lemon-lime water tumble over the side onto his already drenched pants, I decided to go back to my podcast.

A a couple of minutes later, just as I was about to push the attendant call button realizing there is still enough on the tray to drip on me if the plane banked right, he shifts in his seat and starts to wake. Half awake, it takes at least a couple of minutes for him to realize that he’s covered in sugar water and a couple more for him to reach up and press the call button to ask for napkins. Which by the way were the only words he spoke the entire flight.

The API Settings Window in Tweetdeck allows you to change the frequency of updates against three APIs: all friends, replies, and direct messages. The genius in his technique is that you can set up a search in Tweetdeck for your replies and it doesn’t count against your API limit.

I want to get all messages and direct messages delivered to Tweetdeck so I set my frequencies as shown in the image below. I like to leave a little slack, just in case I want to temporarily use another client, so I set the timings to use 90% of my API limit.

Tweetdeck Twitter API Settings

The second step is to create a search query for replies. I chose to only search on @donthorp mostly because I didn’t want to see my face in the column. To create this column, click on the search icon near the top (the magnifying glass) and then enter your twitter username in the search field. You can re-arrange your columns as you see fit. I chose to keep the Replies column and move it to the end and moved the new @donthorp column over where I had replies before.

DropBox

The technique I use also happens to take advantage of DropBox. If you’re not familiar with DropBox you should be. There are many ways to keep files in sync on multiple computers, some easier than others. I consider DropBox to be the easiest, most pain-free method I’ve found to date. DropBox provides a client integration piece that simply appears in your file system. Put a file in a folder and it will show up on all of your other machines.

DropBox also allows you to create shared folders for transferring files between friends and co-workers. John and I use it fairly regularly to transfer files that aren’t in our subversion repositories. I’ve also used DropBox to safely get files to and from my servers with their web interface.

TweetDeck on OS X

This howto assumes that you are already using TweetDeck on at least one computer. It should also be noted that this technique has the same limitation as h0bble’s; You must only run TweetDeck on one machine at a time. If this becomes an issue for me, I’ve considered creating a launcher for TweetDeck that would place a lock file in the shared directory to help prevent accidental launches. The same launcher could also monitor a termination file to close the remote instance.

TweetDeck stores your configuration files in your Preferences folder. As mentioned in h0bbel’s article, a random number is part of the filename. I used the Unix command find to locate my TweetDeck files. Open a terminal window in your home directory and issue the following command.

find . -name TweetDeckFast.*

You will most likely see multiple results. You are interested in the folder Library/Preferences/TweetDeckFast.[random number]. Inside that folder is a sub-folder named Local Store that TweetDeck uses to store your configuration files. There are two files of interest in that folder.

preferences_[twitter_username].xml
td_26_[twitter_username].db

The Technique

The technique takes advantage of the soft links I mentioned earlier. For those unfamiliar with the term, a soft link is simply a name or alias that provides a direct link to another name anywhere in the file system. Soft links will be created to fool TweetDeck into thinking its files are where they have always been, when in fact, they’re going to reside in the DropBox. DropBox will insure that the contents of the TweetDeck files are synchronized on all other computers where you have a DropBox as long as those machines have a network connection.

The reason it is important to run TweetDeck on only one machine at a time is that DropBox will try and keep the files in sync thereby generating conflicts in the files. The other reason is that you will blow through your Twitter API limits in no time.

How

1. Stop TweetDeck on all computers
2. Open a Terminal window in your home directory
3. Create a folder in your DropBox.
   

   mkdir Dropbox/TweetDeck

4. Change to your TweetDeck Local Store
   

   cd Library/Preferences/TweetDeckFast.*/Local\ Store

5. Move your files to your DropBox
   

   mv preferences*.xml ~/Dropbox/TweetDeck
   mv td_26_*.db ~/Dropbox/TweetDeck

6. Create your soft links. Please replace [twitter_username] with your twitter name. For example I used my twitter username donthorp.
   

   ln -s /Users/$USER/Dropbox/TweetDeck/preferences_[twitter_username].xml preferences_[twitter_username].xml

   ln -s /Users/$USER/Dropbox/TweetDeck/td_26_[twitter_username].db  td_26_[twitter_username].db

On every other machine you want to use your synchronized TweetDeck files do the following

1. Stop TweetDeck
2. Open a Terminal window in your home directory
3. Verify that DropBox has synchronized your TweetDeck files. You should see the .xml and .db files.
   

   ls Dropbox/TweetDeck

4. Change to your TweetDeck Local Store
   

   cd Library/Preferences/TweetDeckFast.*/Local\ Store

5. Remove your files so that you can create your symlink. Note: If you want to preserve them, copy them somewhere else before deleting.
   

   rm preferences*.xml
   rm td_26_*.db

6. Create your soft links. Please replace [twitter_username] with your twitter name. For example I used my twitter username donthorp.
   

   ln -s /Users/$USER/Dropbox/TweetDeck/preferences_[twitter_username].xml preferences_[twitter username].xml

   ln -d /Users/$USER/Dropbox/TweetDeck/td_26_[twitter_username].db td_26_[twitter_username].db

Now you are ready to enjoy TweetDeck with all of your setting synchronized between machines. While I used DropBox for this solution, it is not required. Any method you have of moving the actual TweetDeck files between machines will suffice. Personally, using DropBox made it simple, efficient, and took advantage of my current workflow.

More information is available in Dell to Pay a post by Jonathan Hiskes.

Download for FREE.

This offer is valid for non-members and current members. I believe I heard Leo say the offer expires February 15th.

If you’re not into audiobooks I’ve provided a link to the book on Amazon where you can order it in print form. Click on the “Buy from Amazon.com” button and order it today.

1 or more tubes of biscuits
1 little smokie per biscuit
Use cooking times and temperature from biscuit packaging.

Lightly grease a cookie sheet. Using one sausage per biscuit, wrap the smokie snuggly with a biscuit and place on the cookie sheet.

Apparently, I failed the “wrap smokie snuggly” part on some of the “Piggies in a Blanket” and ended up with new recipe which I’ve called “Piggies In and On a Blanket”. Next time I will try wetting the edge of the biscuit so that it stays together, or roll the biscuit until it appears seamless.

Close ups.

We ripped out the 13+ year old carpet and replaced it with a floating bamboo floor. The walls were painted with a dark brown (Behr Bison Brown) and then covered the brown with red (Behr Daredevil). The eggshell finish for the red gives it a glazed look and provides for an interesting finish over the brown. The original baseboard was repainted and replaced and shoe molding will be added to cover any gaps from contraction.

I hope to post a howto in the future, now that we’ve installed two floating floors using this bamboo flooring,

Earlier today, I tried depositing a check from a company only to have the the teller inform me that it couldn’t be deposited today. When I asked why, she told me it was due to the fact that it wasn’t in the system. Once I got home and looked up the number for the company, I called them, explained the situation, and they simply retransmitted the check details.

Since I helped build an ACH processing solution, I was curious about what this system entailed. Descriptions from several locations appeared using this Google search. One of the better descriptions was from SafeChecks. Here is an excerpt.

Positive Pay is an automated fraud detection tool offered by the Cash Management Department of most banks. In its simplest form, it is a service that matches the account number, check number and dollar amount of each check presented for payment against a list of checks previously authorized and issued by the company. All three components of the check must match exactly or it will not pay.

The purpose of this system is to help prevent check fraud and the simplicity of it is encouraging. I can only hope that during transmittal they take the time to digitally sign the transactions.

I had a couple of small issues with the plugin, version 2.0.3 and WordPress 2.7, but that didn’t stop me from working around it for photos.

1. The “Send to Editor” button didn’t work for me so I had to enter the short code by hand (FireFox 3.0 and Safari on OS X Leopard)
2. When using the RSS feed for recently updated galleries, it didn’t find the gallery images to display so I took that feature out.

If you notice anything wrong with the site, please leave a comment on this post.